know
where I seem to have seen you--at Venice. You remember, don't you,
George?"

By this time sparks had lighted up in Sir Lionel's eyes, as if he were a
Turk, and one of the ladies of his harem were unjustly suspected.

"It is impossible for Mr. Tyndal to remember what didn't happen," he
said, dropping a lump of ice into his voice. "You saw someone who looked
like her in Venice, perhaps, but not my ward."

I was almost sorry for the poor Tyndals, who meant no harm, though they
had the air of being so frightfully rich and prosperous that it seemed
ridiculous to pity them.

"Of course, it could only have been a resemblance," said Mr. Tyndal,
with that snubby glare at Mrs. Tyndal which husbands and wives keep for
each other.

"It must have been," she responded, taking up her cue; for naturally
they didn't want to begin their acquaintance with a distinguished person
by offending him.

These signs of docility caused Sir Lionel to relent and come down off
his high horse. Whenever he has been at all haughty or impatient with
his sister (whose denseness would sometimes try a saint) he is sorry in
a minute, and tries to be extra nice. It was the same now in the case of
the poor Tyndals, whose Etonian cousin had all the time been gazing up
at him with awed adoration, as of a hero on a pedestal; and suddenly a
quaint thought struck me. I remembered about the Bengalese Sir Lionel
was supposed to have executed for some offence or other, and I could see
him being sorry immediately afterward, tearing around trying to stick
their heads on again, and saying pleasant words.

Well, he stuck the Tyndals' heads on very kindly, so that they almost
forgot they'd ever been slashed off; and when Mrs. Norton came out,
which she did in a few minutes, looking as if she'd washed the dust off
her face with kitchen soap, we all strolled up and down together, till
it was time for dinner.

Mrs. Tyndal walked with me, but not a word did she say about Venice.
That subject was to be tabooed, but I'm far from sure she was convinced
of her mistake, and she couldn't overcome her intense interest in my
features. However, she seems good-natured, as if even to please Mrs.
Senter she wouldn't care to do me a bad turn. Only, I don't think people
do things from motives as a rule, do you? They just suddenly find they
want to do them, and presto, the things are done! That's why the world's
so exciting.

We chatted non-committally of cabbages and kings