scinate him first and bore him afterwards. Moreover she's not
so pretty as you make her out; she has a scrappy little figure."

"No doubt; but one doesn't in the least notice it."

"Not now," said Mrs. Meldrum, "but one will when she's older."

"When she's older she'll be a princess, so it won't matter."

"She has other drawbacks," my companion went on. "Those wonderful eyes
are good for nothing but to roll about like sugar-balls--which they
greatly resemble--in a child's mouth. She can't use them."

"Use them? Why, she does nothing else."

"To make fools of young men, but not to read or write, not to do any
sort of work. She never opens a book, and her maid writes her notes.
You'll say that those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.
Of course I know that if I didn't wear my goggles I shouldn't be good
for much."

"Do you mean that Miss Saunt ought to sport such things?" I exclaimed
with more horror than I meant to show.

"I don't prescribe for her; I don't know that they're what she
requires."

"What's the matter with her eyes?" I asked after a moment.

"I don't exactly know; but I heard from her mother years ago that even
as a child they had had for a while to put her into spectacles and
that, though she hated them and had been in a fury of disgust, she would
always have to be extremely careful. I'm sure I hope she is!"

I echoed the hope, but I remember well the impression this made upon
me--my immediate pang of resentment, a disgust almost equal to Flora's
own. I felt as if a great rare sapphire had split in my hand.

III

This conversation occurred the night before I went back to town. I
settled on the morrow to take a late train, so that I had still my
morning to spend at Folkestone, where during the greater part of it I
was out with my mother. Every one in the place was as usual out with
some one else, and even had I been free to go and take leave of her I
should have been sure that Flora Saunt would not be at home. Just where
she was I presently discovered: she was at the far end of the cliff, the
point at which it overhangs the pretty view of Sandgate and Hythe. Her
back however was turned to this attraction; it rested with the aid
of her elbows, thrust slightly behind her so that her scanty little
shoulders were raised toward her ears, on the high rail that inclosed
the down. Two gentlemen stood before her whose faces we couldn't see but
who even as observed from the rear were