Lady Parham greeted the hostess with effusion. It was a rich house, and these small informal dances were said to be more helpful to matrimonial development than larger affairs. Then she perceived Ashe, and her whole manner changed. There was a very evident bristling, and she gave him a greeting deliberately careless.
"Confound the woman!" thought Ashe, and his own pride rose.
"Working as hard as usual, Lady Parham?" he asked her, with a smile.
"If you like to put it so," was the stiff reply. "There is of course a good deal of going out."
"I hope, if I may say so, you don't allow Lord Parham to do too much of it."
"Lord Parham never was better in his life," said Lord Parham's spouse, with the air of putting down an impertinence.
"That's good news. I must say when I saw him this afternoon I thought he seemed to be feeling his work a good deal."
"Oh! he's worried," said Lady Parham, sharply,—"worried about a good many things." She turned suddenly and looked at her companion—an insolent and deliberate look.
"Ah ! that's where the wives come in!" replied Ashe, unperturbed. "Look at Mrs. Loraine. She has the art to perfection—hasn't she? The way she cushions Loraine is something wonderful to see."
Lady Parham flushed angrily. The suggested comparison between herself and that incessant rattle and blare of social event through which she dragged her husband, conducting thereby a vulgar campaign of her own as arduous as his and far more ambitious, and the ways and character of gentle Mrs. Loraine, absorbed in the man she adored, scatter-brained and absent-minded towards the rest of the world, but for him all eyes and ears, an angel of shelter and protection, did not now reach the Prime Minister's wife for the first time. But she had no opportunity to launch a retort, even supposing she had one ready, for the music ceased, and the tide of dancers surged towards the doors. It brought Kitty abruptly face to face with Lady Parham.
"Oh! how d'you do?" said Kitty, in a tone that was already an offence, and she held out a small hand with an indescribably regal air.
Lady Parham just touched it, glanced at the owner from top to toe, and walked away. Kitty slipped in beside Ashe for a moment, with her back to the wall,—laughing and breathless.
"I say, Kitty," said Ashe, bending over her and speaking in her small ear, "I thought Lady Parham was eternally obliged to us. What's wrong with her?"
"Only that I can't stand her," said Kitty. "What's the good of trying?" She looked up, a flame of mutiny in her cheeks.
"What, indeed?" said Ashe, feeling as reckless as she. "Her manners are beyond the bounds. But look here, Kitty—don't you think you'll come home? You know you do look uncommonly tired."
Kitty frowned.
"Home? Why, I'm only just beginning to enjoy myself! Take me into the cool, please," she said to the boy who had been dancing with her, and who still hovered near, in case his divinity might allow him yet a few more minutes. But as she put out her hand to take his arm, Ashe saw her waver and look suddenly across the room.
A group parted that had been clustering round a farther door, and Ashe perceived Cliffe leaning against the doorway, with his arms crossed. He was surrounded by pretty women, with whom he seemed to be carrying on a bantering warfare. Involuntarily Ashe watched for the recognition between him and Kitty. Did Kitty's lips move?—was there a signal? If so, it passed like a flash. Kitty hurried away; and Ashe was left, haughtily furious with himself that, for the first time in his life, he had played the spy.
He turned, in his discomfort, to leave the dancing-room. He himself enjoyed society frankly enough. Especially since his marriage had he found the companionship of agreeable women delightful. He went instinctively to seek it and drive out this nonsense from his mind. Just inside the larger drawing-room, however, he came across Mary Lyster, sitting in a corner apparently alone. Mary greeted him, but with an evident coldness. Her manner brought back all the preoccupa-
