ink any the worse of
him. How is he to know that a well-bred person hungers for little crown
biscuits? We are so affected that there is nothing for him to go by."

"And he's a dear, candid darling! Of course he is. He shall have
everything he wants." Achilles appears to accept the concession as
deserved, but to be ready to requite it with undying love.

"It is all the excellence of his heart, I am aware, and a certain
simplicity and directness," says Adrian. "But all the same he mustn't
spoil ladies' dresses--beyond a certain point, of course. I have been
very curious to know, Lady Gwendolen, whether his paws came off--the
marks of them, I mean--on that lovely India muslin I saw you in three
weeks ago, just before this unfortunate affair which has given so much
trouble to everybody at--at ... Arthur's Bridge, of course! Couldn't
think of the name at the moment. At Arthur's Bridge. I'm afraid he
didn't do that dress any good."

"It wasn't a new dress," says Gwen, "as far as I remember." A point her
maid would know more about, clearly.

Lady Ancester seems to think a little _ex post facto_ chaperonage would
not be inappropriate. "Gwen was out of bounds, I understand," she says;
which means absolutely nothing, but sounds well.

The remark seems somehow to focus the conversation, and become a
stepping-stone to a review of the recent events. Evidently the principal
actor in them takes that view. "I had no idea whom I was speaking to,"
he says, "still less that Lady Gwendolen had taken the trouble to come
away from the house with so kind a motive. Of course, I have heard all
about it from my sister."

Gwen perfectly understands. "And then you walked over to Drews Thurrock,
and Achilles' collar broke, and he got away." She speaks as one who
waits for more.

"He did, and I am sorry to say he forgot himself. The old Adam broke out
in him in connection with the sudden springing of a hare, just under his
nose. It was almost the moment after his collar broke, and it is quite
possible he thought I meant to let him go. But after all, Achilles is
human, and really I could not blame him in any case. Try to see the
thing from his point of view. Fancy discovering an unused faculty lying
dormant--art, song, eloquence--and an unprecedented opportunity for its
use! Do you know, I don't believe Achilles had ever so much as seen a
hare before?--not a live one! He smelt one once at a poulterer's--a dead
one that was starting for the An