pression of that picture, sir, led to something else. Are you
prepared, Lord Theign, to entertain a proposition?"

Lord Theign met Mr. Bender's eyes while this inquirer left these few
portentous words to speak for themselves. "To the effect that I part to
you with 'The Beautiful Duchess of Waterbridge'? No, Mr. Bender, such a
proposition would leave me intensely cold."

Lord John had meanwhile had a more headlong cry. "My dear Bender, I
_envy_ you!"

"I guess you don't envy me," his friend serenely replied, "as much as I
envy Lord Theign." And then while Mr. Bender and the latter continued to
face each other searchingly and firmly: "What I allude to is an overture
of a strong and simple stamp--such as perhaps would shed a softer light
on the difficulties raised by association and attachment. I've had some
experience of first shocks, and I'd be glad to meet you as man to man."

Mr. Bender was, quite clearly, all genial and all sincere; he intended
no irony and used, consciously, no great freedom. Lord Theign, not less
evidently, saw this, and it permitted him amusement. "As rich man to
poor man is how I'm to understand it? For me to meet _you_," he added,
"I should have to be tempted--and I'm not even temptable. So there we
are," he blandly smiled.

His blandness appeared even for a moment to set an example to Lord John.
"'The Beautiful Duchess of Waterbridge,' Mr. Bender, is a golden apple
of one of those great family trees of which respectable people don't lop
off the branches whose venerable shade, in this garish and denuded age,
they so much enjoy."

Mr. Bender looked at him as if he had cut some irrelevant caper. "Then
if they don't sell their ancestors where in the world are all the
ancestors bought?"

"Doesn't it for the moment sufficiently answer your question," Lord
Theign asked, "that they're definitely not bought at Dedborough?"

"Why," said Mr. Bender with a wealthy patience, "you talk as if it were
my interest to be _reasonable_--which shows how little you understand.
I'd be ashamed--with the lovely ideas I have--if I didn't make you
kick." And his sturdy smile for it all fairly proclaimed his faith.
"Well, I guess I can wait!"

This again in turn visibly affected Lord John: marking the moment from
which he, in spite of his cultivated levity, allowed an intenser and
more sustained look to keep straying toward their host. "Mr. Bender's
bound to _have_ something!"

It was even as if after a minute