ootmen proceed to shut the
hall-door. Well, what's to be done? Am I to rush away to the wars, and
come back a field-marshal? Am I to make myself so obnoxious in
Parliament that the noble earl will give me his daughter in order to
shut my mouth? Oh, no; they simplify matters nowadays; 'as you were' is
the word of command; go back to the theatre; paint your face and put on
your finery; play the fool along with the rest of the comic people, and
we'll come and look at you from the stalls; and if you will marry, why,
then, keep in your own sphere, and marry Kate Burgoyne!"

For now--when he was peevish and discontented and restless, or even sick
at heart, he hardly knew why--there was no Nina to solace and soothe him
with her gentle companionship, her wise counsel, her bright and cheerful
and wayward good-humor. Apparently he had as many friends and
acquaintances as before, and yet he was haunted by a curious sense of
solitude. Of a morning he would go out for a stroll along the familiar
thoroughfares--Bond Street, Conduit Street, Regent Street, where he knew
all the shops at which Nina used to linger for a moment, to glance at a
picture or a bonnet--and these seemed altogether different now. He could
not have imagined he should have missed Nina so much. Instead of dining
in his rooms at five o'clock and thereafter walking down to Sloane
Street to have a cup of tea with Nina and Mlle. Girond before they all
three set out for the theatre, he spent most of his afternoons at the
Garden Club, where there was a good deal of the game of poker being
played by young gentlemen in the up-stairs rooms. And sometimes he
returned thither after the performance, seeking anew the distraction of
card-playing and betting, until he became notorious as the fiercest
plunger in the place. Nobody could "bluff" Lionel Moore; he would "call"
his opponent if he himself had nothing better than a pair of twos; and
many a solid handful of sovereigns he had to pay for that privilege of
gazing.

Day after day went by, and still there was no word of Nina; at times he
was visited by sudden sharp misgivings that terrified him. The heading
of a paragraph in a newspaper would startle his eyes; and then he would
breathe again when he found that this poor wretch who had grown weary of
the world was unknown to him. Every evening, when Mlle. Girond came into
the theatre, she was met by the same anxious, wondering question; and
her reply was invariably the same.