laughter. "The world
cannot spare you, Contessa." "We can't permit any such sacrifice." And,
"Retire! Till to-morrow?" her courtiers said.

"Not till to-morrow. I do more than retire. I abdicate," said the
Contessa, waving her beautiful hands as if in farewell.

"This sounds very mysterious; for an abdication is different from a
withdrawal; it suggests a successor."

"Which is an impossibility," another said.

The Contessa distributed her smiles with gracious impartiality to all,
but she kept a little watch upon young Montjoie, who was eager amid the
ring of her worshippers. "Nevertheless, it is more than a successor,"
she said, playing with them, with a strange pleasure. To be thus
surrounded, flattered more openly than men ever venture to flatter a
woman whom they respect, addressed with exaggerated admiration,
contemplated with bold and unwavering eyes, had come by many descents to
be delightful to the Contessa. It reminded her of her old triumphs--of
the days when men of a different sort brought homage perhaps not much
more real but far more delicate, to her feet. A long career of baths and
watering-places, of Baden and Homburg, and every other conceivable
resort of temporary gaiety and fashion, had brought her to this. Sir
Tom, who was not taking much share in the conversation, stood with his
arm on the mantelpiece, and watched her and her little court with
compassionate eyes. He had laughed often before; but he did not laugh
now. Perhaps the fact that he was himself no longer her first object
helped to change the aspect of affairs. He had consented to invite these
men as old acquaintances; but it was intolerable to him to see this
scene going on in the room in which his wife was; and the Contessa's
radiant satisfaction seemed almost horrible to him in Lucy's presence.
Lucy was seated at some distance from the group, her face turned away,
her head bent, to all appearance very intent upon the book she was
reading. He looked at her with a sort of reverential impatience. She was
not capable of understanding the degradation which her own pure and
simple presence made apparent. He could not endure her to be there
sanctioning the indecorum;--and yet the tenacity with which she held her
place, and did what she thought her duty to her guest, filled him with a
wondering pride. No other scene, perhaps, he thought, in all England,
could have presented a contrast so curious.

"The Contessa speaks in riddles," said one of