You might as well ask me my age. The indiscretion would be equal, and the result the same. Love! I have a proper fear of the word. When two play at love they spoil the game. It's enough that he says he loves me."

Emilia looked relieved. "Poor lady!" she sighed.

"Poor!" Lady Charlotte echoed, with curious eyes fixed on the puzzle beside her.

"Tell me you will not believe him," Emilia continued. "He is mine; I shall never give him up. It is useless for you or any one else to love him. I know what love is now. Stop while you can. I can be sorry for you, but I will not let him go from me. He is my lover."

Emilia closed her lips abruptly. She produced more effect than was visible. Lady Charlotte drew out a letter, saying, "Perhaps this will satisfy you."

"Nothing!" cried Emilia, jumping to her feet.

"Read it—read it; and, for heaven's sake, ma fille sauvage, don't think I'm here to fight for the man! He is not Orpheus; and our modern education teaches us that it's we who are to be run after. Will you read it?"

"No."

"Will you read it to please me?"

Emilia changed from a look of quiet opposition to gentleness of feature. "Why will it please you if I read that he has flattered you? I never lie about what I feel; I think men do." Her voice sank.

"You won't allow yourself to imagine, then, that he has spoken false to you?"

"Tell me," retorted Emilia, "are you sure in your heart—as sure as it beats each time—that he loves you? You are not."

"It seems that we are dignifying my gentleman remarkably," said Lady Charlotte. "When two women fight for a man, that is almost a meal for his vanity. Now, listen. I am not, as they phrase it, in love. I am an experienced person—what is called a woman of the world. I should not make a marriage unless I had come to the conclusion that I could help my husband, or he me. Do me the favour to read this letter."

Emilia took it and opened it slowly. It was a letter in the tone of the gallant paying homage with some fervour. Emilia searched every sentence for the one word. That being absent, she handed back the letter, her eyes lingering on the signature.

"Do you see what he says?" asked Lady Charlotte; "that I can be a right hand to him, as I believe I can."

"He writes like a friend." Emilia uttered this as when we have a contrast in the mind.

"You excuse him for writing to me in that style?"

"Yes; he may write to any woman like that."

"He has latitude! You really fancy that's the sort of letter a friend would write?"

"That is how Mr. Powys would write to me," said Emilia. Lady Charlotte laughed. "My unhappy Merthyr!"

"Only if I could be a great deal older," Emilia hastened to add; and Lady
Charlotte slightly frowned, but rubbed it out with a smile.

Rising, the lady said: "I have spoken to you upon equal terms; and remember, very few women would have done what I have done. You are cared for by Merthyr Powys, and that's enough. It would do you no harm to fix your eyes upon him. You won't get him; but it would do you no harm. He has a heart, as they call it; whatever it is, it's as strong as a cable. He is a knight of the antique. He is specially guarded, however. Well, he insists that you are his friend; so you are mine, and that is why I have come to you and spoken to you. You will be silent about it, I need not say. No one but yourself is aware that Lieutenant Pole does me the honour to liken me to the good old gentleman who accompanied Telemachus in his voyages, and chooses me from among the handmaidens of earth. On this head you will promise to be silent."

Lady Charlotte held forth her hand. Emilia would not take it before she had replied, "I knew this before you came," and then she pressed the extended fingers.

Lady Charlotte drew her close. "Has Wilfrid taken you into his confidence so far?"

Emilia explained that she had heard it from his father.

The lady's face lit up as from a sting of anger. "Very well—very well," she said; and, presently, "You are right when you speak of the power of lying in men. Observe—Wilfrid told me that not one living creature knew there was question of an engagement between us. What would you do in my case?"

Emilia replied, "Forgive him; and I should think no more of it."

"Yes. It would be right; and, presuming him to have the vice, I could be of immense service to him, if at least he does not lie habitually. But this is a description of treachery, you know."

"Oh!" cried Emilia, "what kind of treachery is that, if he only will keep his heart open for me to give all mine to it!"

She stood clutching her hands in the half-sobbing ecstasy which signalises a spiritual exaltation built on disquiet. She had shown small emotion hitherto. The sight of it was like the sight of a mighty hostile power to Lady Charlotte—a power that moved her—that challenged, and irritated, and subdued her. For she saw there something that she had not; and being of a nature leaning to great-mindedness, though not of the first rank, she could not meanly mask her own deficiency by despising it. To do this is the secret evil by which souls of men and women stop their growth.