voice calling. Lord Findon noticed with relief its even,
silvery note. The carriage was waiting, and in a few minutes she was
seated beside him, and they were making their way eastwards through
the sunset streets.

'Dear?' he said, with timid interrogation, laying his hand momentarily
on hers.

Eugenie was looking out of window with her face turned away.

'He was very--kind,' she said, rather deliberately. 'Don't let us talk
about it, papa--but wait--and see!'

Lord Findon understood that she referred to Elsie Bligh--that she had
sown her seed, and must now let it germinate.

But herself--what had it cost her? And he knew well that he should
never ask the question; and that, if he did, she would never answer
it.

By the time they were threading the slums of Seven Dials, she was
talking rather fast and flowingly of Fenwick.

'You have brought the cheque, papa?'

'I have my cheque-book.'

'And you are quite certain about the pictures?'

'Quite.'

'It will be nice to make him happy,' she said, softly. 'His letters
have been pretty doleful.'

'What has he found to write about?' exclaimed Lord Findon, wondering.

'Himself, mostly!' she laughed. 'He likes rhetoric--and he seems
to have found out that I do too. As I told you, he began with an
apology--and since then he writes about books and art--and--and the
evils of aristocracy.'

'Bless my soul, what the deuce does he know about it! And you answer
him?'

'Yes. You see he writes extremely well--and it amuses me.'

Privately, he thought that if she encouraged him beyond a very
moderate point, Fenwick would soon become troublesome. But whenever
she pleaded that anything 'amused' her, he could never find a word to
say.

Every now and then he watched her, furtively trying to pierce that
grey veil in which she had wrapt herself. To-morrow morning, he
supposed, he should hear her step on the stairs, towards eight
o'clock--should hear it passing his door in going, and an hour
later in coming back--and should know that she had been to a little
Ritualist church close by, where what Lady Findon called 'fooleries'
went on, in the shape of 'daily celebrations' and 'vestments' and
'reservation.' How lightly she stepped; what a hidden act it was;
never spoken of, except once, between him and her! It puzzled him
often; for he knew very well that Eugenie was no follower of things
received. She had been a friend of Renan and of Taine in her French
days; and he, who