er she was not, as the widow of a British officer,
an Englishwoman to all intents and purposes as well as in the strict
letter of the law. He could not say that he was in love with her; but
neither could he say that one of these days he might not be. If he ever
were it would certainly be on the principle of _faute de mieux_; but
many a man has chosen his wife on no better ground than that.

Such criticism as he had to make to her disadvantage he could form there
and then in the chapel while they were reading the lessons or chanting
the psalms. She sat two or three rows in front of him, on the other side
of the aisle. There was something about Drusilla in church that
suggested a fish out of water. He had noticed it before. She was
restless, inattentive; she kept turning her head to see who was behind
her or at the other end of the pew; she rarely found the places in the
prayer-book or knew just when to kneel down; when she did kneel down she
sank into an awkward little bunch; every now and then she stifled, or
did not stifle, a yawn.

Ashley had a theory that manner in church is the supreme test of the
proprieties. He knew plenty of women who could charm at a dinner or
dazzle at a dance, but who displayed their weaknesses at prayer. All
unwitting to herself, poor Drusilla was inviting his final--or almost
final--judgment on her future, so far at least as he was concerned, for
the simple reason that she twitched and sighed and forgot to say the
Amens.

And just then his eyes traveled to her neighbor--a tall young lady,
dressed in white, with no color in her costume but a sash of hues
trembling between sea-green and lilac. She was slender and graceful,
with that air at once exquisite and unassuming that he had seen in the
Englishwoman of his dreams. Though he could get no more than a side
glimpse of her face, he divined that it was pure and that it must be
thrown into relief by the heavy coil of coppery-brown hair. But what he
noticed in her first was that which he thought of concerning other women
last--a something holy and withdrawn, a quality of devotion without
which he had no conception of real womanhood. It seemed to be a matter
of high courtesy with her not to perceive that the choir-boys sang out
of tune or that the sermon was prosy. In the matter of kneeling he had
seen only one woman in his life--and she the highest in the land--who
did it with this marvelous grace at once dignified and humble. "It takes
old E