and?" said Lord Fawn.

"Now that you have run into scandal, I shall have done," said Violet.

Half an hour after this, when Phineas was preparing to fight his way
out of the house, he was again close to Madame Max Goesler. He had
not found a single moment in which to ask Violet for an answer to his
old question, and was retiring from the field discomfited, but not
dispirited. Lord Fawn, he thought, was not a serious obstacle in his
way. Lady Laura had told him that there was no hope for him; but
then Lady Laura's mind on that subject was, he thought, prejudiced.
Violet Effingham certainly knew what were his wishes, and knowing
them, smiled on him and was gracious to him. Would she do so if his
pretensions were thoroughly objectionable to her?

"I saw that you were successful this evening," said Madame Max
Goesler to him.

"I was not aware of any success."

"I call it great success to be able to make your way where you will
through such a crowd as there is here. You seem to me to be so stout
a cavalier that I shall ask you to find my servant, and bid him
get my carriage. Will you mind?" Phineas, of course, declared that
he would be delighted. "He is a German, and not in livery. But if
somebody will call out, he will hear. He is very sharp, and much more
attentive than your English footmen. An Englishman hardly ever makes
a good servant."

"Is that a compliment to us Britons?"

"No, certainly not. If a man is a servant, he should be clever enough
to be a good one." Phineas had now given the order for the carriage,
and, having returned, was standing with Madame Max Goesler in the
cloak-room. "After all, we are surely the most awkward people in
the world," she said. "You know Lord Fawn, who was talking to Miss
Effingham just now. You should have heard him trying to pay me a
compliment before dinner. It was like a donkey walking a minuet, and
yet they say he is a clever man and can make speeches." Could it be
possible that Madame Max Goesler's ears were so sharp that she had
heard the things which Lord Fawn had said of her?

"He is a well-informed man," said Phineas.

"For a lord, you mean," said Madame Max Goesler. "But he is an oaf,
is he not? And yet they say he is to marry that girl."

"I do not think he will," said Phineas, stoutly.

"I hope not, with all my heart; and I hope that somebody else
may,--unless somebody else should change his mind. Thank you; I am so
much obliged to you. Mind you come and call