He stopped suddenly, for the two muzzles of
his glass were resting on the new faces just
come in. The glass dropped on his knees. Then
he gave a half start; half rose and sank again
into his chair.

His eyes were fixed on the apparition of the
bright lady and her two companions. A few
"amateurs" in the parterre were looking too;
but the whole house was absorbed in the play.
The girl beside Fermor, with tearful earnest
eyes, and the round chin resting on her hand,
was wrapped up in the young tutor. She had
never heard anything so interesting. There was
such agony, such suffering in his face—that——

Suddenly she heard her husband whisper
bluntly:

"We must go away. Come!"

She came back to practical life.

"Go away!" she said, in blank astonishment.
"Why? Oh, no, no! Just at this point, too!"

"I am sick of it," said he, rising. "I have a
headache. I suppose you will not ask me to
stay if I am ill?"

She rose in a second, and gathered up her
cloak and "matériel." She looked back
wistfully at the noble young tutor, whose face showed,
actual writhings of moral suffering; his sense of
the degradation of his position was so very acute.
As she turned to go, her cloak caught in a chair
and overturned it. A flash of faces was turned
to them, and a subdued "ts—s—" was heard.

"There! they will all see us!" said Fermor,
with something like ferocity, "and I wanted to
get out without noise."

He caught her arm roughly, and hurried her
away.

She was frightened. "What is the matter,
dear Charles?" she said again.

"Nothing," he said, shortly. "I did not say
there was. Now please don't tease me, and let
us get home in quiet."

He hurried her along the great passages. They
got to the top of the flight of stairs.

"Take my arm!" he said.

There, too, at the same point, they were met
by another party going away. It was the brilliant
lady and her companions, who could not have
heard a sentence of the new play, and were
literally going away almost as soon as they had
come.

Though in a little trouble, the girl was struck
by the brightness of the Spanish-looking face
and the flashing of her beauty, which she had
now seen for the first time.

"O look, look, Charles!" she whispered,
hurriedly; when, to her amazement, the lady came
to meet them.

"Captain Fermor," said the stranger, and in
her voice there was a sustained chanting sound
almost melancholy, "what a meeting! How
strange, how curious! And at a theatre of all
places in the world!"

Fermor was not yet composed enough to
answer steadily. He forced a kind of smile.

"Not forgotten me, surely?" said the lady.

"You remember when we last met, or when we
were to have met?"

"Yes," said Fermor, faintly.

"And this," said she, "is Mrs. Fermor? I
was sure of it, at a distance. I was one of your
husband's old acquaintances. One of that crowd
which he had to brush through, when life for him
was literally a ball-room. One of the crowd
whom he has paid visits to, and taken down to
supper, and whose name he has forgotten by
next morning."

Fermor was now collected enough to speak as
Fermor was accustomed to speak.

"We are going home," he said; "a stupid
play, that has given me a headache."

"How long do you remain in this place?" said
the Spanish lady, abruptly, addressing Mrs.
Fermor.

The latter, who had been looking at the
strange lady quite fascinated, answered hastily,
"O—we are to stay a month, I believe."

Fermor struck in hurriedly: "No, no. We
leave to-morrow; we are obliged to return. Got
a letter to-day."

"Stay a month? Leave to-morrow?" said the
Spanish lady, with a smile. "Then your plans
are scarcely decided. You recollect my brother?"
she added. " This is Mr. Romaine, his friend."

"I am afraid," said Fermor, "we must go
away now. We have to——"

"Where are you staying?"

"At the Grand Hotel," said the English girl,
who was addressed.

"O, then we shall see you there. Ours is
Number 110. We have hardly chosen our rooms
yet. But we shall see each other very often, and
renew an old acquaintance. Indeed, we shall
come and see you to-morrow," said the Spanish-
looking lady, gaily. "Louis and I. You will be
at home at twelve?"

"Yes, yes," said Fermor, hastily. "Delighted.
To-morrow, at twelve."

"Good night, then," said the Spanish-looking
lady. "I am so glad to have met you again.
This is life, you see, all over, parting in a ball-
room—meeting at a theatre. Now, Mr. Romaine,
be bitter on that text."

Mr. Romaine—whose face had a handsome
gauntness, and whose black eyes, and whose black
moustache hanging like curls over his mouth,
had an odd attraction for Mrs. Fermor—said
something in a low voice to his friend.

"Ah, exactly," said the Spanish lady. "To-
morrow, then, at twelve. Good night."

In the dark carriage, where Fermor's face
could not be seen, the girl began to chatter and
wonder.

"And you have forgotten her name?" she
said, suddenly. "How wonderful! I should
have remembered that splendid face till my
dying day. I shall long to see her again."

"Yes," said he, catching at what she had
suggested; "is it not odd? I shall recollect
it later, I suppose."

"It is so strange," she said; "if I had seen a