LITMIR.BIZ

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      ‘Is she so much admired?’

      ‘Of course she is. You do not often see her style, and she talks and goes on at no end of a rate.’

      ‘I remember how she grew excited at the ball, after disliking the prospect.’

      ‘Is this mere general admiration,’ asked John, ‘or anything more serious?’

      ‘Upon my word, I cannot say. There is no earnest on her part. She will rattle on with a poor fellow one night as if she had eyes for no one else, then leave him in the lurch the next. She cares not a rush for any of them, only wants to be run after. As to her followers, some of them are really smitten, I fancy. There was Fitzhugh, but he is an old hand, and can pay her in her own coin, and that sober-faced young Mervyn—it is a bad case with him. In fact, there is a fresh one whenever she goes out—a Jenny Dennison in high life—but the most bitten of all, I take it, is Lord St. Erme.’

      ‘Lord St. Erme!’ exclaimed both auditors in a breath.

      ‘Ay. She met him at that breakfast, walked about the gardens with him all the morning, and my mother wrote to my aunt, I believe, that she was booked. Then at this Bryanstone soiree, the next night, Fitzhugh was in the ascendant—poor St. Erme could not so much as gain a look.’

      ‘So he is in London!’ said Violet. ‘Do tell me what he is like.’

      ‘Like a German music-master,’ said Arthur. ‘As queer a figure as ever I saw. Keeps his hair parted in the middle, hanging down in long lank rats’ tails, meant to curl, moustache ditto, open collar turned down, black ribbon tie.’