The large drawing-room was lighted comfortably, though not brilliantly. The guests already assembled had drawn into a semicircle before the fire, and were listening to Mrs. Harden's last good story, when the door opened, and Philip Rondelet entered.
"Forgive me if I am late, kind hostess," he said; "and," he added, looking over Mrs. Harden's shoulder, "tell me, while she is not looking, who that young girl in white is. Do I know her?"
"No; it is Miss Margaret Ruysdale, a stranger from the North,—here for the winter with an invalid papa, the gentleman with one arm. I will present you to her, as you are to take her in to dinner. Miss Ruysdale, Mr. Philip Rondelet."
The young man made a deep obeisance, and the girl bowed simply to him, with nothing of the drooping of the lids or sudden uplooking into his eyes which he had often noticed in his introductions to young women in society. This Margaret Ruysdale from the North looked at him as quietly and civilly as she would have looked into the face of his grandmother.
"I have seen you before, Mr.—should I not say Dr. Rondelet?"
"I hardly know, mademoiselle; this is the second time to-day I have been so called. I
