ould have to know a little more about the case."

He was evidently longing for a confidant.

"Suppose er--one girl was ripping, but--well--on the stage, for
instance."

"On the stage!" exclaimed the Baroness. "Yes, please go on. What about
the other girl?"

"Suppose she had simply pots of money, but the fellow didn't know much
more about her?"

"I certainly shouldn't marry a girl I didn't know a good deal about,"
said the Baroness with conviction.

Lord Tulliwuddle seemed impressed with this opinion.

"That's just what I have begun to think," said he, and gazed down at his
pumps with a meditative air.

The Baroness thought the moment had come when she could effect a pretty
little surprise.

"Which of them is called Eva?" she asked archly.

To her intense disappointment he merely stared.

"Don't you really know any girl called Eva?"

He shook his head.

"Can't think of any one."

Suspicion, fear, bewilderment, made her reckless.

"Have you been in Scotland--at your castle, as I heard you were going?"

A mighty change came over the young man. He backed away from her,
stammering hurriedly,

"No--yes--I--er--why do you ask me that?"

"Is there any other Lord Tulliwuddle?" she demanded breathlessly.

He gave her one wild look, and then without so much as a farewell had
turned and elbowed his way out of the room.

"It's all up!" he said to himself. "There's no use trying to play that
game any longer--Essington has muddled it somehow. Well, I'm free to do
what I like now!"

In this state of mind he found himself in the street, hailed the first
hansom, and drove headlong from the dangerous regions of Belgravia.

. . . . . .

Till the middle of the next day the Baroness still managed to keep her
own counsel, though she was now so alarmed that she was twenty times on
the point of telling everything to her mother. But the arrival of a note
from Sir Justin ended her irresolution. It ran thus:

"MY DEAR ALICIA,--I have just learned for certain that Lord T. is at his
place in Scotland. Singularly enough, he is described as apparently of
foreign extraction, and I hear that he is accompanied by a friend of the
name of Count Bunker. I am just setting out for the North myself, and
trust that I may be able to elucidate the mystery. Yours very truly,

"JUSTIN WALLINGFORD."

"Foreign extraction! Count Bunker!" gasped the Baroness; and without
stopping to debate the matter again, she rushed into her moth