fine Thread

CHAPTER XX.

How Tita takes high Ground, and how she brings her Husband, of all
People, to her Feet

CHAPTER XXI.

How everyone goes to Lady Warbeck's Dance, and helps to make it a
Success; and how many curious Things are said and done there

CHAPTER XXII.

How Rylton asks his Wife to tread a Measure with him, and how the
Fates weave a little Mesh for Tita's pretty Feet

CHAPTER XXIII.

How Marian fights for Mastery; and how the Battle goes; and how
Chance befriends the Enemy

CHAPTER XXIV.

How Rylton makes a most dishonourable Bet, and how he repents of it;
and how, though he would have withdrawn from it, he finds he cannot

CHAPTER XXV.

How Tita told a Secret to Tom Hescott in the Moonlight; and how he
sought to discover many Things, and how he was most innocently
baffled

CHAPTER XXVI.

How Tita looks at herself in the Glass, and wonders; and how she
does her Hair in quite a new Style, and goes to ask Sir Maurice what
he thinks of it; and how he answers her

CHAPTER XXVII.

How Sir Maurice feels uneasy; and how Tita, for once, shows herself
implacable, and refuses to accept the Overtures of Peace. And how a
little Gossip warms the Air

THE HOYDEN.

CHAPTER I.

HOW DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND, AND HOW THE SPARKS FLEW.

The windows are all wide open, and through them the warm, lazy
summer wind is stealing languidly. The perfume of the seringas from
the shrubbery beyond, mingled with all the lesser but more delicate
delights of the garden beneath, comes with the wind, and fills the
drawing-room of The Place with a vague, almost drowsy sense of
sweetness.

Mrs. Bethune, with a face that smiles always, though now her very
soul is in revolt, leans back against the cushions of her lounging
chair, her fine red hair making a rich contrast with the pale-blue
satin behind it.

"You think he will marry her, then?"

"Think, think!" says Lady Rylton pettishly. "I can't afford to
_think_ about it. I tell you he _must_ marry her. It has come to the
very last ebb with us now, and unless Maurice consents to this
arrangement----"

She spreads her beautiful little hands abroad, as if in eloquent
description of an end to her sentence.

Mrs. Bethune bursts out laughing. She can always laugh at pleasure.

"It sounds like the old Bible story," says she; "you have an only
son, and you must sacrifice him!"

"Don't study to be absurd!" says Lady Rylton, with a click of her
fa