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known you carried such things about with you! Indeed, I will be more
careful for the future. We are outwalking the mainguard, I see. Shall
we wait for them here? It is a good point of view. One forgets that
there are two invalids to be considered.
Did Royston Keene speak thus purposely, on the principle of those
practiced periodical writers, who always leave their hero in extreme
peril, or their heroine on the verge of a moral precipice, in order to
keep our curiosity tense till the next number? If not, chance favored
him by producing the very effect he would have desired.
His companion's fair cheek flashed again, and this time a little
vexation had something to say to it. It was incontestably correct to
wait for the rest of the party, but she would have preferred originating
the suggestion. Besides, the conversation had begun to interest her; and
she liked being amused too well not to be sorry for its being cut short
abruptly. She thought Major Keene talked epigrammatically; and the
undercurrent of irony that ran through all he said was not so obtrusive
as to seriously offend her.
It was no light ordeal he had just passed through. First impressions are
not made on women of Cecil Tresilyan's class so easily as they are upon
guileless _debutantes_; but they are far more important and lasting. It
is useless attempting to pass off counterfeit coin on those expert
moneychangers; but they value the pure gold all the more when it rings
sharp and true. It is always so with those who have once been Queens of
Beauty. A certain imperial dignity attaches to them long after they have
ceased to reign: over the brows that have worn worthily the diadem
there still hangs the phantasm of a shadowy crown. There need be nothing
of repellent haughtiness, or, what is worse, of evident condescension;
but, though they are perfectly gentle and goodnatured, we risk our
little sallies and sarcasms with timidity, or at least diffidence;
feeling especially that a commonplace compliment would be an inexcusable
profanation. Our sword may be ready and keen enough against others, but
before _them_ we lower its point, as the robber did to Queen Margaret in
the lonely wood. We are conscious of treading on ground where stronger,
and wiser, and better men have knelt before us; and own that the altar
on which things so rare and precious have been laid has a right to be
fastidious as to the quality of incense.
Not the less did such glory of past royalty surround the Tresilyan
because she had abdicated, and never been dethroned.
There is something singularly refreshing in the enthusiasm that one
pretty and fascinating woman will display when speaking of another
highly gifted as herselfperhaps even more so. It seems to me there is
more honesty here, and less stagetrick and conventionality, than is to

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