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[Illustration: THE YELLOW HOUSE]




                     THE
                 YELLOW HOUSE

                MASTER OF MEN

                      BY

            E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM

                  AUTHOR OF

   "THE MISCHIEF-MAKER" "BERENICE" "HAVOC"
      "THE LOST LEADER" "THE MALEFACTOR"

                [Illustration]

                  VOLUME ONE

                   NEW YORK
             P. F. COLLIER & SON




       Copyright 1908
   By C. H. Doscher & Co.

       Copyright 1912
   By P. F. Collier & Son




THE YELLOW HOUSE




CHAPTER I

THE YELLOW HOUSE


Positively every one, with two unimportant exceptions, had called
upon us. The Countess had driven over from Sysington Hall, twelve
miles away, with two anaemic-looking daughters, who had gushed
over our late roses and the cedar trees which shaded the lawn. The
Holgates of Holgate Brand and Lady Naselton of Naselton had presented
themselves on the same afternoon. Many others had come in their train,
for what these very great people did the neighborhood was bound
to endorse. There was a little veiled anxiety, a few elaborately
careless questions as to the spelling of our name; but when my father
had mentioned the second "f," and made a casual allusion to the
Warwickshire Ffolliots--with whom we were not indeed on speaking
terms, but who were certainly our cousins--a distinct breath of
relief was followed by a gush of mild cordiality. There were wrong
Ffolliots and right Ffolliots. We belonged to the latter. No one
had made a mistake or compromised themselves in any way by leaving
their cards upon a small country vicar and his daughters. And earlier
callers went away and spread a favorable report. Those who were
hesitating, hesitated no longer. Our little carriage drive, very
steep and very hard to turn in, was cut up with the wheels of many
chariots. The whole county within a reasonable distance came, with two
exceptions. And those two exceptions were Mr. Bruce Deville of Deville
Court, on the borders of whose domain our little church and vicarage
lay, and the woman who dwelt in the "Yellow House."

I asked Lady Naselton about both of them one afternoon. Her ladyship,
by the way, had been one of our earliest visitors, and had evinced
from the first a strong desire to become my sponsor in Northshire
society. She was middle-aged, bright, and modern--a thorough little
cosmopolitan, with a marked absence in her deportment and mannerisms
of anything bucolic or rural. I enjoyed talking to her, and this was
her third visit. We were sitting out upon the lawn, drinking afternoon
tea, and making the best of a brilliant October afternoon. A yellow
gleam from the front of that oddly-shaped little house, flashing
through the dark pine trees, brought it into my mind. It was only from
one particular point in our garden that any part of it was visible at
all. It chanced that I occupied that particular spot, and during a
lull in the conversation it occurred to me to ask a question.

"By the by," I remarked, "our nearest neighbors have not yet been to
see us?"

"Your nearest neighbors!" Lady Naselton repeated. "Whom do you mean?
There are a heap of us who live close together."

"I mean the woman who lives at that little shanty through the
plantation," I answered, inclining my head towards it. "It is a woman
who lives there, isn't it? I fancy that some one told me so, although
I have not seen anything of her. Perhaps I was mistaken."

Lady Naselton lifted both her hands. There was positive relish in her
tone when she spoke. The symptoms were unmistakable. Why do the nicest
women enjoy shocking and being shocked?

I could see that she was experiencing positive pleasure from my
question.

"My dear Miss Ffolliot!" she exclaimed. "My dear girl, don't you
really know anything about her? Hasn't anybody told you anything?"

I stifled an imaginary yawn in faint protest against her unbecoming
exhilaration. I have not many weaknesses, but I hate scandal and
scandal-mongering. All the same I was interested, although I did not
care to gratify Lady Naselton by showing it.

"Remember, that I have only been here a week or two," I remarked;
"certainly not long enough to have mastered the annals of the
neighborhood. I have not asked any one before. No one has ever
mentioned her name. Is there really anything worth hearing?"

Lady Naselton looked down and brushed some crumbs from her lap
with a delicately gloved hand. She was evidently an epicure in
story-telling. She was trying to make it last out as long as possible.

"Well, my dear girl, I should not like to tell you all that people
say," she began, slowly. "At the same time, as you are a stranger to
the neighborhood, and, of course, know nothing about anybody, it is
only my duty to put you on your guard. I do not know the particulars
myself. I have never inquired. But she is not considered to be at all
a proper person. There is something very dubious about her record."

"How deliciously vague!" I remarked, with involuntary irony. "Don't
you know anything more definite?"

"I find no pleasure in inquiring into such matters," Lady Naselton
replied a little stiffly. "The opinion of those who are better able to
judge is sufficient for me."

"One must inquire, or one cannot, or should not, judge," I said. "I
suppose that there's something which she does, or does not, do?"

"It is something connected with her past life, I believe," Lady
Naselton remarked.

"Her past life? Isn't it supposed to be rather interesting nowadays to
have a past?"

I began to doubt whether, after all, I was going to be much of a
favorite with Lady Naselton. She set her tea cup down, and looked at
me with distinct disapproval in her face.

"Amongst a certain class of people it may be," she answered, severely;
"not"--with emphasis--"in Northshire society; not in any part of
it with which I am acquainted, I am glad to say. You must allow me
to add, Miss Ffolliot, that I am somewhat surprised to hear you, a
clergyman's daughter, express yourself so."

A clergyman's daughter. I was continually forgetting that. And, after
all, it is much more comfortable to keep one's self in accord with
one's environment. I pulled myself together, and explained with much
surprise--

"I only asked a question, Lady Naselton. I wasn't expressing my
own views. I think that women with a past are very horrid. One is
so utterly tired of them in fiction that one does not want to meet
them in real life. We won't talk of this at all. I'm not really
interested. Tell me about Mr. Deville instead."

Now this was a little unkind of me, for I knew quite well that Lady
Naselton was brimming with eagerness to tell me a good deal about this
undesirable neighbor of ours. As it happened, however, my question
afforded her a fresh opportunity, of which she took advantage.

"To tell you of one, unfortunately, is to tell you of the other," she
said, significantly.

I decided to humor her, and raised my eyebrows in the most approved
fashion.

"How shocking!" I exclaimed.

I was received in favor again. My reception of the innuendo had been
all that could be desired.

"We consider it a most flagrant case," she continued, leaning over
towards me confidentially. "I am thankful to say that of the two Bruce
Deville is the least blamed."

"Isn't that generally the case?" I murmured. "It is the woman who has
to bear the burden."

"And it is generally the woman who deserves it," Lady Naselton
answered, promptly. "It is my experience, at any rate, and I have
seen a good deal more of life than you. In the present case there
can be no doubt about it. The woman actually followed him down here,
and took up her quarters almost at his gates whilst he was away. She
was there with scarcely a stick of furniture in the house for nearly
a month. When he came back, would you believe it, the house was
furnished from top to bottom with things from the Court. The carts
were going backwards and forwards for days. She even went up and
selected some of the furniture herself. I saw it all going on with my
own eyes. Oh! it was the most barefaced thing!"

"Tell me about Mr. Deville," I interrupted hastily. "I have not seen
him yet. What is he like?"

"Bruce Deville," she murmured to herself, thoughtfully. Then she was
silent for a moment. Something that was almost like a gleam of sorrow
passed across her face. Her whole expression was changed.

"Bruce Deville is my godson," she said, slowly. "I suppose that is why
I feel his failure the more keenly."

"He is a failure, then?" I asked. "Some one was talking about him
yesterday, but I only heard fragments here and there. Isn't he very
quixotic, and very poor?"

"Poor!" She repeated the word with peculiar emphasis. Then she rose
from her chair, and walked a step or two towards the low fence which
enclosed our lawn.

"Come here, child."

I stood by her side looking across the sunlit stretch of meadows and
undulating land. A very pretty landscape it was. The farm houses, with
their grey fronts and red-tiled roofs, and snug rickyards close at
hand, had a particularly prosperous and picturesque appearance. The
land was mostly arable and well-cultivated; field after field of
deep golden stubble, and rich, dark soil stretched away to the dim
horizon. She held out her hand.

"You see!" she exclaimed. "Does that look like a poor man's
possessions?"

I shook my head.

"Every village there from east to west, every stone and acre
belongs to Bruce Deville, and has belonged to the Devilles for
centuries. There is no other land owner on that side of the
country. He is lord of the Manor of a dozen parishes!"

I was puzzled.

"Then why do people call him so miserably poor?" I asked. "They say
that the Court is virtually closed, and that he lives the life of a
hermit, almost without servants even."

"He either is or says he is as poor as Job," Lady Naselton continued,
resuming her seat. "He is a most extraordinary man. He was away from
the country altogether for twelve years, wandering about, without any
regular scheme of travel, all over the world. People met him or heard
of him in all manner of queer and out-of-the-way places. Then he lived
in London for a time, and spent a fortune--I don't know that I ought
to say anything about that to you--on Marie Leparte, the singer. One
day he came back suddenly to the Court, which had been shut up all
this time, and took up his quarters there in a single room with an old
servant. He gave out that he was ruined, and that he desired neither
to visit nor to be visited. He behaved in such an extraordinary manner
to those who did go to see him, that they are not likely to repeat the
attempt."

"How long has he been living there?" I asked.

"About four years."

"I suppose that you see him sometimes?"

She shook her head sadly.

"Very seldom. Not oftener than I can help. He is changed so
dreadfully."

"Tell me what he is like."

"Like! Do you mean personally? He is ugly--hideously ugly--especially
now that he takes so little care of himself. He goes about in clothes
my coachman would decline to wear, and he slouches. I think a man who
slouches is detestable."

"So do I," I assented. "What a very unpleasant neighbor to have!"

"Oh, that isn't the worst," she continued. "He is impossible in every
way. He has a brutal temper and a brutal manner. No one could possibly
take him for a gentleman. He is cruel and reckless, and he does
nothing but loaf. There are things said about him which I should not
dare to repeat to you. I feel it deeply; but it is no use disguising
the fact. He is an utter and miserable failure."

"On the whole," I remarked, resuming my chair, "it is perhaps well
that he has not called. I might not like him."

Lady Naselton's hard little laugh rang out upon the afternoon
stillness. The idea seemed to afford her infinite but bitter
amusement.

"Like him, my dear! Why, he would frighten you to death. Fancy any
one liking Bruce Deville! Wait until you've seen him. He is the most
perfect prototype of degeneration in a great family I have ever come
in contact with. The worst of it, too, that he was such a charming
boy. Why, isn't that Mr. Ffolliot coming?" she added, in an altogether
different tone. "I am so glad that I am going to meet him at last."

I looked up and followed her smiling gaze. My father was coming
noiselessly across the smooth, green turf towards us. We both of
us watched him for a moment, Lady Naselton with a faint look of
surprise in her scrutiny. My father was not in the least of the type
of the ordinary country clergyman. He was tall and slim, and carried
himself with an air of calm distinction. His clean-shaven face was
distinctly of the intellectual cast. His hair was only slightly grey,
was parted in the middle and vigorously mobile and benevolent. His
person in every way was faultless and immaculate, from the tips of
his long fingers to the spotless white cravat which alone redeemed
the sombreness of his clerical attire. I murmured a few words of
introduction, and he bowed over Lady Naselton's hand with a smile
which women generally found entrancing.

"I am very glad to meet Lady Naselton," he said, courteously. "My
daughter has told me so much of your kindness to her."

Lady Naselton made some pleasing and conventional reply. My father
turned to me.

"Have you some tea, Kate?" he asked. "I have been making a long round
of calls, and it is a little exhausting."

"I have some, but it is not fit to drink," I answered, striking the
gong. "Mary shall make some fresh. It will only take a minute or two."

My father acquiesced silently. He was fastidious in small things, and
I knew better than to offer him cold tea. He drew up a basket-chair to
us and sat down with a little sigh of relief.

"You have commenced your work here early," Lady Naselton remarked. "Do
you think that you are going to like these parts?"

"The country is delightful," my father answered readily. "As to the
work--well, I scarcely know. Rural existence is such a change after
the nervous life of a great city."

"You had a large parish at Belchester, had you not?" Lady Naselton
asked.

"A very large one," he answered. "I am fond of work. I have always
been used to large parishes."

And two curates, I reflected silently. Lady Naselton was looking
sympathetic.

"You will find plenty to do here, I believe," she remarked. "The
schools are in a most backward condition. My husband says that unless
there is a great change in them very soon we shall be having the
School Board."

"We must try and prevent that," my father said, gravely. "Of course
I have to remember that I am only curate-in-charge here, but still I
shall do what I can. My youngest daughter Alice is a great assistance
to me in such matters. By the by, where is Alice?" he added, turning
to me.

"She is in the village somewhere," I answered. "She will not be home
for tea. She has gone to see an old woman--to read to her, I think."

My father sighed gently. "Alice is a good girl," he said.

I bore the implied reproof complacently. My father sipped his tea for
a moment or two, and then asked a question.

"You were speaking of some one when I crossed the lawn?" he
remarked. "Some one not altogether a desirable neighbor I should
imagine from Lady Naselton's tone. Would it be a breach of
confidence----"

"Oh, no," I interrupted. "Lady Naselton was telling me all about the
man that lives at the Court--our neighbor, Mr. Bruce Deville."

My father set his cup down abruptly. His long walk had evidently tired
him. He was more than ordinarily pale. He moved his basket-chair a few
feet further back into the deep, cool shade of the cedar tree. For a
second or two his eyes were half closed and his eyelids quivered.

"Mr. Bruce Deville," he repeated, softly--"Bruce Deville! It is
somewhat an uncommon name."

"And somewhat an uncommon man!" Lady Naselton remarked, dryly. "A
terrible black sheep he is, Mr. Ffolliot. If you really want to
achieve a triumph you should attempt his conversion. You should try
and get him to come to church. Fancy Bruce Deville in church! The
walls would crack and the windows fall in!"

"My predecessor was perhaps not on good terms with him," my father
suggested, softly. "I have known so many unfortunate cases in which
the squire of the parish and the vicar have not been able to hit it
off."

Lady Naselton shook her head. She had risen to her feet, and was
holding out a delicately gloved hand.

"No, it is not that," she said. "No one could hit it off with
Bruce Deville. I was fond of him once; but I am afraid that he is
a very bad lot. I should advise you to give him as wide a berth as
possible. Listen. Was that actually six o'clock? I must go this
second. Come over and see me soon, won't you, Miss Ffolliot, and bring
your father? I will send a carriage for you any day you like. It is
such an awful pull up to Naselton. Goodbye."

She was gone with a good deal of silken rustle, and a faint emission
of perfume from her trailing skirt. Notwithstanding his fatigue, my
father accompanied her across the lawn, and handed her into her pony
carriage. He remained several minutes talking to her earnestly after
she had taken her seat and gathered up the reins, and it seemed to me
that he had dropped his voice almost to a whisper. Although I was but
a few paces off I could hear nothing of what they were saying. When at
last the carriage drove off and he came back to me, he was thoughtful,
and there was a dark shade upon his face. He sat quite still for
several moments without speaking. Then he looked up at me abruptly.

"If Lady Naselton's description of our neighbor is at all correct," he
remarked, "he must be a perfect ogre."

I nodded.

"One would imagine so. He is her godson, but she can find nothing but
evil to say of him."

"Under which circumstances it would be as well for us--for you girls
especially--to carefully avoid him," my father continued, keeping his
clear, grey eyes steadily fixed upon my face. "Don't you agree with
me?"

"Most decidedly I do," I answered.

But, curiously enough, notwithstanding his evil reputation--perhaps
because of it--I was already beginning to feel a certain amount of
unaccountable interest in Mr. Bruce Deville.




CHAPTER II

ON THE MOOR


After tea my father went to his study, for it was late in the week,
and he was a most conscientious writer of sermons. I read for an
hour, and then, tired alike of my book and my own company, I strolled
up and down the drive. This restlessness was one of my greatest
troubles. When the fit came I could neither work nor read nor think
connectedly. It was a phase of incipient dissatisfaction with life,
morbid, but inevitable. At the end of the drive nearest the road, I
met Alice, my youngest sister, walking briskly with a book under her
arm, and a quiet smile upon her homely face. I watched her coming
towards me, and I almost envied her. What a comfort to be blessed with
a placid disposition and an optimistic frame of mind!

"Well, you look as though you had been enjoying yourself," I remarked,
placing myself in her way.

"So I have--after a fashion," she answered, good humoredly. "Are you
wise to be without a hat, Kate? To look at your airy attire one would
imagine that it was summer instead of autumn. Come back into the house
with me."

I laughed at her in contempt. There was a difference indeed between my
muslin gown and the plain black skirt and jacket, powdered with dust,
which was Alice's usual costume.

"Have you ever known me to catch cold through wearing thin clothes or
going without a hat?" I asked. "I am tired of being indoors. There
have been people here all the afternoon. I wonder that your conscience
allows you to shirk your part of the duty and leave all the tiresome
entertaining to be done by me!"

She looked at me with wide-opened eyes and a concerned face. Alice was
always so painfully literal.

"Why, I thought that you liked it!" she exclaimed. I was in an evil
mood, and I determined to shock her. It was never a difficult task.

"So I do sometimes," I answered; "but to-day my callers have
been all women, winding up with an hour and a half of Lady
Naselton. One gets so tired of one's own sex! Not a single man all the
afternoon. Somebody else's husband to pass the bread and butter would
have been a godsend!"

Alice pursed up her lips, and turned her head away with a look of
displeasure.

"I am surprised to hear you talk like that, Kate," she said,
quietly. "Do you think that it is quite good taste?"

"Be off, you little goose!" I called after her as she passed on
towards the house with quickened step and rigid head. The little sober
figure turned the bend and disappeared without looking around. She was
the perfect type of a clergyman's daughter--studiously conventional,
unremittingly proper, inevitably a little priggish. She was the right
person in the right place. She had the supreme good fortune to be
in accord with her environment. As for me, I was a veritable black
sheep. I looked after her and sighed.

I had no desire to go in; on the other hand, there was nothing to
stay out for. I hesitated for a moment, and then strolled on to the
end of the avenue. A change in the weather seemed imminent. A grey,
murky twilight had followed the afternoon of brilliant sunshine, and a
low south wind was moaning amongst the Norwegian firs. I leaned over
the gate with my face turned towards the great indistinct front of
Deville Court. There was nothing to look at. The trees had taken to
themselves fantastic shapes, little wreaths of white mist were rising
from the hollows of the park. The landscape was grey, colorless,
monotonous. My whole life was like that, I thought, with a sudden
despondent chill. The lives of most girls must be unless they are
domestic. In our little family Alice absorbed the domesticity. There
was not one shred of it in my disposition.

I realized with a start that I was becoming morbid, and turned from
the gate towards the house. Suddenly I heard an unexpected sound--the
sound of voices close at hand. I stopped short and half turned
round. A deep voice rang out upon the still, damp air--

"Get over, Madam! Get over, Marvel!"

There was the sound of the cracking of a whip and the soft patter of
dogs' feet as they came along the lane below--a narrow thoroughfare
which was bounded on one side by our wall and on the other by the open
stretch of park at the head of which stood Deville Court. There must
have been quite twenty of them, all of the same breed--beagles--and
amongst them two people were walking, a man and a woman. The man was
nearest to me, and I could see him more distinctly. He was tall and
very broad, with a ragged beard and long hair. He wore no collar, and
there was a great rent in his shabby shooting coat. Of his features I
could see nothing. He wore knickerbockers, and stockings, and thick
shoes. He was by no means an ordinary looking person, but he was
certainly not prepossessing. The most favorable thing about him was
his carriage, which was upright and easy, but even that was in a
measure spoiled by a distinct suggestion of surliness. The woman
by his side I could only see very indistinctly. She was slim, and
wore some sort of a plain tailor gown, but she did not appear to be
young. As they came nearer to me, I slipped from the drive on to the
verge of the shrubbery, standing for a moment in the shadow of a tall
laurel bush. I was not seen, but I could hear their voices. The woman
was speaking.

"A new vicar, or curate-in-charge, here, isn't there, Bruce? I fancy I
heard that one was expected."

A sullen, impatient growl came from her side.

"Ay, some fellow with a daughter, Morris was telling me. The parson
was bound to come, I suppose, but what the mischief does he want with
a daughter?"

A little laugh from the woman--a pleasant, musical laugh.

"Daughters, I believe--I heard some one say that there were two. What
a misogynist you are getting! Why shouldn't the man have daughters if
he likes? I really believe that there are two of them."

There was a contemptuous snort, and a moment's silence. They were
exactly opposite to me now, but the hedge and the shadow of the
laurels beneath which I was standing completely shielded me from
observation. The man's huge form stood out with almost startling
distinctness against the grey sky. He was lashing the thistles by the
side of the road with his long whip.

"Maybe!" he growled. "I've seen but one--a pale-faced, black-haired
chit."

I smothered a laugh. I was the pale-faced, black-haired chit, but it
was scarcely a polite way of alluding to me, Mr. Bruce Deville. When
they had gone by I leaned over the gate again, and watched them
vanish amongst the shadows. The sound of their voices came to me
indistinctly; but I could hear the deep bass of the man as he slung
some scornful exclamation out upon the moist air. His great figure,
looming unnaturally large through the misty twilight, was the last to
vanish. It was my first glimpse of Mr. Bruce Deville of Deville Court.

I turned round with a terrified start. Almost at my side some heavy
body had fallen to the ground with a faint groan. A single step, and
I was bending over the prostrate form of a man. I caught his hand and
gazed into his face with horrified eyes. It was my father. He must
have been within a yard of me when he fell.

His eyes were half closed, and his hands were cold. Gathering up my
skirts in my hand, I ran swiftly across the lawn into the house.

I met Alice in the hall. "Get some brandy!" I cried,
breathlessly. "Father is ill--out in the garden! Quick!"

She brought it in a moment. Together we hurried back to where I had
left him. He had not moved. His cheeks were ghastly pale, and his eyes
were still closed. I felt his pulse and his heart, and unfastened his
collar.

"There is nothing serious the matter--at least I think not," I
whispered to Alice. "It is only a fainting fit."

I rubbed his hands, and we forced some brandy between his
lips. Presently he opened his eyes, and raised his head a little,
looking half fearfully around.

"It was her voice," he whispered, hoarsely. "It came to me through
the shadows! Where is she? What have you done with her? There was a
rustling of the leaves--and then I heard her speak!"

"There is no one here but Alice and myself," I said, bending over
him. "You must have been fancying things. Are you better?"

"Better!" He looked up at both of us, and the light came back into his
face.

"Ah! I see! I must have fainted!" he exclaimed. "I remember the study
was close, and I came to get cool. Yet, I thought--I thought----"

I held out my arm, and he staggered up. He was still white and shaken,
but evidently his memory was returning.

"I remember it was close in the study," he said--"very close; I was
tired too. I must have walked too far. I don't like it though. I must
see a doctor; I must certainly see a doctor!"

Alice bent over him full of sympathy, and he took her arm. I walked
behind him in silence. A curious thought had taken possession of me. I
could not get rid of the impression of my father's first words, and
his white, terrified face. Was it indeed a wild fancy of his, or had
he really heard this voice which had stirred him so deeply? I tried
to laugh at the idea. I could not. His cry was so natural, his terror
so apparent! He had heard a voice. He had been stricken with a sudden
terror. Whose was the voice--whence his fear of it? I watched him
leaning slightly upon Alice's arm, and walking on slowly in front
of me towards the house. Already he was better. His features had
reassumed their customary air of delicate and reserved strength. I
looked at him with new and curious eyes. For the first time I wondered
whether there might be another world, or the ashes of an old one
beneath that grey, impenetrable mask.




CHAPTER III

MR. BRUCE DEVILLE


My father's first sermon was a great success. As usual, it was
polished, eloquent, and simple, and withal original. He preached
without manuscript, almost without notes, and he took particular
pains to keep within the comprehension of his tiny congregation. Lady
Naselton, who waited for me in the aisle, whispered her warm approval.

"Whatever induced your father to come to such an out-of-the-way
hole as this?" she exclaimed, as we passed through the porch into
the fresh, sunlit air. "Why, he is an orator! He should preach at
cathedrals! I never heard any one whose style I like better. But all
the same it is a pity to think of such a sermon being preached to such
a congregation. Don't you think so yourself?"

I agreed with her heartily.

"I wonder that you girls let him come here and bury himself, with his
talents," she continued.

"I had not much to do with it," I reminded her. "You forget that I
have lived abroad all my life; I really have only been home for about
eight or nine months."

"Well, I should have thought that your sister would have been more
ambitious for him," she declared. "However, it's not my business,
of course. Since you are here, I shall insist, positively insist,
upon coming every Sunday. My husband says that it is such a drag
for the horses. Men have such ridiculous ideas where horses are
concerned. I am sure that they take more care of them than they do of
their wives. Come and have tea with me to-morrow, will you?"

"If I can," I promised. "It all depends upon what Providence has in
store for me in the shape of callers."

"There is no one left to call," Lady Naselton declared, with her foot
upon the carriage step. "I looked through your card plate the other
day whilst I was waiting for you. You will be left in peace for a
little while now."

"You forget our neighbor," I answered, laughing. "He has not called
yet, and I mean him to."

Lady Naselton leaned back amongst the soft cushions of her barouche,
and smiled a pitying smile at me