yours, and I
accept your loyal service."

She laid her white hand in his, and the touch of those slender fingers
thrilled him as nothing had ever done before.

"I am your sovereign liege," she said, with a smile. "If I come to you
in distress you are sworn, remember, to help me. If I require your
service, it is mine."

"Yes," he said; "at all times and at all hours."

"I shall go through life the more happily for knowing that I have so
true and chivalrous a defender," she replied.

And they sat in the flower-wreathed balcony, watching the sun set over
the river, and the simple, dreaming boy believed himself in Paradise.

It seemed to him that the spell was broken when the other guests came
out and joined them. As he could no longer talk to Lady Amelie, he was
content to stand by himself and think over his own happiness. To him it
was like a beautiful page from some old romance, that this lovely lady
should have smiled upon him, and have laid her gracious hand upon him,
calling him her knight. How insufferable the empty talk of the men
around him seemed! Ah, if they knew how he was sworn to do the lady's
service!

It was more than an hour afterward when Lady Lisle was free again; then
he enjoyed the felicity of helping her with her shawls, and of sitting
by her side while they drove home in the moonlight.

Lady Amelie was the very queen of coquettes. In the course of all her
long experience, she had never, through all her flirtations, said one
word too much. But no other woman living could imply so much by a
gesture, a look or an exclamation. One morning Basil had called early,
in the hope of escorting her to an exhibition of paintings. He found her
alone, and while he was talking to her, a gentleman entered the room--a
tall, portly, sensual-looking man, whom Basil disliked at first sight.
Lady Amelie introduced him to her husband, Lord Lisle, who was very
cordial in his greeting.

"Lady Lisle has often spoken of you," he said; "but this is, strange to
say, the first time I have ever had the pleasure of seeing you. I met
your mother, Lady Carruthers, a year ago, and have a most pleasant
recollection of her."

Lord Lisle sat down, and Lady Amelie gave a pretty little sigh,
expressive of her resignation to something unpleasant.

And truly a conversation with Lord Lisle was about as unpleasant a
matter as one could well experience. His language was coarse; his ideas
coarser still. There was very little to rede