life had combined thoroughly to spoil
him. "Do you maintain that will can win a woman?" he added, sharply.

She was the woman to laugh outright at such a suggestion. "No, nor that
it can uproot love, although it can give it a good shaking and lock it
in the dark room. I doubt if you love Julia Kaye, but you will find that
out for yourself. You might bring her to terms by flirting a little with
your American cousin--"

"My what?" He opened his eyes as widely as he had ever done when a
school-boy.

"Of course--I forgot you know nothing of her. She wrote me from
Ambleside--I infer she has been 'doing' England; and as her credentials
were unimpeachable I asked her down. She has inherited a part of the
northern estate and was brought up in the neighboring town of
Rosewater--the American names are too silly. She seems quite _comme il
faut_ and is remarkably handsome. I detest Americans, as you know, but
there certainly is something in blood. I liked her at once. She looks
clever, and is quite off the type--none of the usual fluff. If she
doesn't bore me I shall keep her here for a while."

"I wish you would adopt her," he said, fondly. "I shouldn't be jealous,
for I hate to think of you so much alone." He rose and kissed her
lightly on the forehead, experience teaching him to avoid a stray hair
from the carefully built coiffure. "I'll see if I can waylay Julia on
the stairs; she is always late. Keep from eleven to twelve for me
to-morrow morning. I want to tell you about the campaign. It was a
glorious fight!" His eyes sparkled at the memory of it. "I felt as if
every bit of me had never been alive at once before. My opponent was a
splendid chap. It meant something to beat him. The other side was in a
rage!--more than once yelled for half an hour after I took the platform.
When I finished they yelled again for half an hour--to a different
tune." His slight, thin, rather graceless figure seemed suddenly to
expand, even to grow taller. Some hidden magnetism burst from him like
an aura, and his cold pasty face and light gray eyes flamed into
positive beauty. "It was glorious! Glorious! I was intoxicated--I could
have reeled, little as they suspected it. I wouldn't part for a second
with the certainty that I am the biggest figure in young England to-day.
I hate to sleep and forget it. If I cultivated modesty I should renounce
one of the exquisite pleasures of life. Humility is a superstition. The
man who doesn't weed it out i