made us homesick."

"A whole long year in your brother-in-law's house, gaming, dancing and—unless I am misinformed—play-acting and fox-hunting, has still left you with an appetite for the follies of the court. I doubt not," said Lady Drumloch. "Does your ladyship return to Yorkshire to-day? or to-morrow? I understand that you traveled without escort or baggage and by the public conveyance!"

"Do not be angry with us, dear Grandmother," pleaded Prue, her bright eyes filling with tears (the minx always had a supply at her command). "You do not want us to go back to-morrow, do you? Are you not a little tired of the excellent Lowton's conversation, and do you not weary for your little Prue to read you Mr. Pope's latest poem and Mr. Steele's new play? and make you die of laughing over her adventures with the Yorkshire squires?"

"And not only the squires," put in Peggie, who had been standing rather in the background, eagerly awaiting a chance to bring herself into notice. "Prue has had adventures with gallants more romantic than Yorkshire squires!"

"Ah! is that Margaret Moffat?" cried the old lady. "'Tis sure where Prudence is, her shadow can not be far away! And, pray, what have your adventures been? Have not even bumpkin squires fallen to your charms? Surely Prudence has not carried off all the honors there as well as here?"

This was a hard thrust, for Peggie was as plain as her cousin was fair, and had entered her fourth decade without one serious assault upon her maiden heart. Devoted to Prue, she was too loyal to think that this was partly the fault of the youthful widow's all-devouring coquetry, but she was very human, and it wounded her to be forced into acknowledging the contrast.

"Alack, Peggie made short work of their hearts," cried Prue, coming to the rescue. "I only turned their heads. 'Tis strange how foolish men will always be about a widow."

"Foolish enough to marry one widow after being jilted by another," acquiesced the grandmother dryly. "I hear thy erstwhile lover, Lord Beachcombe, has married the Widow Curzon. The baker's daughter hath a second chance of wearing strawberry-leaves."

"She may have them for aught I care—along with the meanest, ugliest, most disagreeable man that ever decked his empty head withal," cried Prudence. "I am going to marry the finest gentleman in England—the bravest and handsomest—and the cleverest, too. When a man of parts is in Parliament, 'tis his own fault if he be not in the Cabinet—and once in the Cabinet there are garters and coronets to be had for the trouble of reaching after them."

"A politician, too!" sneered the countess. "Pray, which of our worthy statesmen has had his head turned by the widow?"

"Sir Geoffrey Beaudesert," replied Prue, and having got so far she stopped, and the blood rushed in a torrent to her face, crimsoning even her forehead and neck.

"Sir Geoffrey Beaudesert!" the old lady repeated slowly, while her dark, brilliant eyes seemed to burn down into Prue's inmost soul. "The same that fought the duel with Colonel O'Keefe?"

"Surely," murmured Prue, "I could do no better than give myself to the man who killed my traducer. If Colonel O'Keefe misunderstood or misinterpreted a piece of girlish bravado—was I to blame? And if he dared to comment disparagingly upon what he did not understand, and make a public jest of a woman who had only played a harmless joke upon him—you, dear Grandmother, would be the last to reproach the gentleman who drew sword in her vindication."

"Thereby leading every one to suppose that there was something to vindicate," retorted Lady Drumloch. "If the marriage really takes place, it will put a complete quietus upon ill-natured tongues, but bethink you how they will wag if this should prove another of your affaires manquées!"

"I am glad that you approve, Madam," said Prue, with an air of the deepest respect, as she again sank gracefully down in a most profound curtsey.

"I said nothing about approval," replied her grandmother sternly. "I know your Sir Geoffrey Beaudesert—a Whig—a renegade, whose father was a good Catholic and a 'King's man.' The son would have made a fitting husband for your father's daughter if he had been loyal to his father's king—but you know well that I would rather see you the wife of the least of Jacobites than the greatest of Whigs. Go your own wilful way and do not pretend to ask my approval."

"I am not married to him yet," said Prue, who had not been unprepared for a vigorous protest from her ancestress, and for obvious reasons desired to placate her. "Nor would I contemplate such a step until my dear grandmother's recovery set me free from anxiety. And now, if your ladyship will permit us to kiss your hand, we will withdraw, as we grieve to hear that your physician has forbidden you all excitement."

During the whole interview the two girls had remained standing—not being invited to seat themselves, nor venturing to do so without permission. As they withdrew after saluting the tapering, ivory fingers of the invalid, she called after them, with more graciousness than she had yet shown, "You may return in the evening and read me Mr. Pope's poem. I have had it these three weeks and could not bring myself to let Lowton stumble through it. 'Twill give me something to think of besides an old woman's gout and gruel."

CHAPTER III

SIR GEOFFREY'S ARRIVAL

Lady Drumloch was not really half so ill as she fancied herself, and no better medicine could have been prescribed to hasten her convalescence than the gaiety and cheerfulness that her two granddaughters infused into the atmosphere of the little house in Mayfair, as soon as they had recovered from the fatigues of their journey.

Instead of lying in bed grumbling at the length of the lonely days and pain-weary nights, her ladyship allowed herself to be cajoled into rising and reclining on a couch, which was then wheeled into the adjoining room by James and the faithful Lowton. At first this was only for an hour or two a day, and the invalid, refusing to admit that she could be, in any way, benefited by the lively gossip of her granddaughters, had insisted that the reading of sermons and other pious works suited better with her age and infirmities than plays and poetry. But by the end of the week she had abandoned Atterbury and Taylor for the Tatler and the latest works of Pope and Prior, and was thirsting for yet more exciting entertainment, which she knew to be tantalizingly near at hand.

As soon as the return of the cousins became known, their numerous friends, who had contented themselves with polite inquiries after the invalid, while Lowton was the sole dispenser of news, displayed a touching solicitude about her condition. Every afternoon Lady Prue held quite a little levee—at which the sickness of the old countess up-stairs did not interfere greatly with the gaiety below. Day by day these cheerful sounds grew more and more exasperating to Lady Drumloch, whose passion for scandal was only whetted by the comments of the two girls, and who chafed rebelliously under the restrictions of the doctor, and led the devoted