than possible you
will not dispel my illusions; there will not be--"

"You mean to imply, delicately," he interrupted her, "that you do not
consider me worthy of being added to the list of your acquaintances?"

"I really have given the matter no thought, and I do not see what
advantage either side could derive from further acquaintance." But
she colored slightly as she spoke, and turned to him an angrily severe
profile.

"Don't you think," he said--and his calm, drawling tone formed a
contrast to her own lack of control which she could not fail to
appreciate--"don't you think that you judge me with exaggerated
harshness? Do you think the life of any one of these men who have
surrounded you to-night, and upon whom you certainly did not frown,
would bear inspection? It would almost appear as if I had personally
incurred your displeasure, you are so very hard upon me. You forget
that my offense could not have any individual application for you. Had
I known you, you might reasonably have been indignant had I gone from
you, a young girl, to things which you held to be wrong. But I did not
know you; you must remember that. And as for the wrong itself, I hope
the knowledge of greater wrong may never come to you. When you have
lived in the world a few years longer, I am very much afraid you will
look upon such things with an only too careless eye."

The cruel allusion to her youth told, and the girl's cheek flushed,
as she threw back her head with a spirited movement which delighted
Dartmouth, while the lanterns in her eyes leaped up afresh. Where had
he seen those eyes before?

"I don't know what your ideas of honor may be in regard to the young
ladies of your acquaintance," she said, with an additional dash of
ice in her voice, "but it seems to me a peculiar kind of honor which
allows a man to insult his hostess by making love to a married woman
in her house."

"Pret-ty good for a baby!" thought Dartmouth. "She could not have
done that better if she had been brought up Lady Langdon's daughter,
instead of having been under that general's tuition, and emancipated
from a life of seclusion, just about six months. Decidedly, she is
worth cultivating." He looked at her reflectively. That he was in
utter disgrace admitted of not a doubt. Women found little fault with
him, as a rule. They had shown themselves willing, with an aptitude
which savored of monotony, to take him on any terms; and to be sat in
judgment upon by a pe