she had known hitherto.
"Were you afraid of me?" she asked, beginning to smile.
"A little, I confess."
"Why? And if you were, why did you make Signor Ghisleri introduce you to me?"
"Because nobody likes to own to being afraid. Besides, Ghisleri is a very old friend of mine, and I can trust him not to lead me into danger."
"Have you known him long?" asked Laura. "I have often wondered what he is really like. I mean his character, you know, and what he thinks about."
"He thinks a great deal. He is one of the most complicated characters I ever knew, and I am not at all sure that I understand him yet, though we have known each other ten years. He is a good friend and a rather indifferent enemy, I should say. His chief apparent peculiarity is that he hates gossip. You will not find it easy to get from him a disagreeable remark about any one. Yet he is not good-natured."
"Perhaps he is afraid to say what he thinks," suggested the young girl.
"I doubt that," answered Arden, with a smile. "He has not a particularly angelic reputation, I believe, but I never heard any one say that he was timid."
"As you pretend to be," added Laura. "Do you know? You have not answered my question. Why were you afraid of me, if you really were?"
Lord Herbert answered one question by another, and the conversation continued pleasantly enough. It was a relief to him to find a young and beautiful girl of his own nationality in surroundings with which neither he nor she were really in sympathy. In the course of half an hour they both felt as though they had known one another a long time. The admiration Arden had felt for Laura at first sight had considerably increased, and she on her side had half forgotten that he was a cripple. Indeed, when he was seated, his deformities were far less noticeable than when he stood or painfully moved about from place to place.
The two talked of a variety of subjects, but, with the exception of the few words spoken about Ghisleri, there was no more reference to personalities for a long time.
"I am keeping you away from the dancing," Arden said at last, as he realised that the room was almost empty and that he had been absorbing the beautiful Miss Carlyon's attention longer than might be pleasant to her.
"Not at all," answered Laura. "I do not dance much."
"Why not? Do you not like dancing?" He asked the question in a tone of surprise.
"On the contrary. But I am not taken out very often—perhaps because they think me a foreigner. It is natural enough."
"Very unnatural, it seems to me. Besides, I believe you are exaggerating, so as not to make me feel uncomfortable. It is of no use, you know; I am not at all sensitive. Shall we go into the ball-room?"
"No; I would rather not, just yet."
"Shall I go and get Ghisleri to take you back?" inquired Arden, with a little smile.
"Why?"
"Because I might make you look ridiculous," answered the cripple, quietly.
He watched her, and saw a quick, pained look pass over her face. It was at that particular moment that he began to love her, as he afterwards remembered. She turned her eyes upon him as she answered after a moment's hesitation.
"Lord Herbert, will you please never say anything like that to me again?"
"Certainly not, if it offends you."
"It does not offend me. I do not mean that."
"What, then? Please tell me. I am not at all sensitive."
"It pains me. I do not like to fancy that any one can think such things of me, much less. … " she stopped short and looked down, slowly opening and shutting her fan.
"Much less?"
Laura hesitated for some seconds, as though choosing her words with more than ordinary care.
"Much less one whom it might pain to think them," she said at last.
The smile that had been on Arden's face faded away in the silence that followed, and his lips moved a little as though he felt some kind of emotion, while his large thin hands closed tightly upon his withered knee.
"Have I said too much?" she asked, suddenly breaking the long pause.
"Or not quite enough, perhaps," he answered in a low voice.
Again they were both silent, and they both wondered inwardly that in less than an hour's acquaintance they should have reached something like a crisis. At last Laura rose slowly and deliberately, intending to give her companion time to get to his feet.
"Will you give me your arm?" she said when he stood beside her. "I want to introduce you to my mother."
Arden bent his head and held up his right arm for her hand. He was considerably shorter than she. Then they walked away together, she erect and easy in her girlish gait, he weak-kneed and awkward, seeming to unjoint half his body at every painful step, helping himself along at her side with the stick he held in his free hand—a strangely assorted couple, the world said, as they went by.
"My mother's name is Gerano, Princess of Gerano," said Laura, by way of explanation, as they came within sight of her.
"And is your father—I mean, is Prince Gerano—living?" asked Arden. He had almost forgotten her name and her nationality in the interest he felt in herself.
"Yes; but he rarely goes into society. I am very fond of him," she added, scarcely knowing why. "Mother," she said, as they came up to the Princess, "Lord Herbert Arden."
The Princess smiled and held out her hand. At that moment Pietro Ghisleri came up. He had not been seen since he had left Laura and Arden together. By a coincidence, doubtless, the Contessa dell' Armi had disappeared at about the same time: she had probably gone home, as she was not seen again in the ball-room that evening. But the world in its omniscience knew that there was a certain boudoir beyond the supper-room, where couples who did not care to dance were left in comparative peace for a long time. The world could have told with precision the position of the small sofa on which Ghisleri and the lovely Contessa invariably spent an hour when they met in that particular house.
"Will you give me a turn, Miss Carlyon?" asked Ghisleri, as Arden began to talk with the Princess.
"Yes." Laura was really fond of a certain amount of dancing when a good partner presented himself.
"What do you think of my friend?" inquired Pietro, as they moved away together.
"I like him very much. He interests me."
"Then you ought to be grateful to me for bringing him to you."
"Do you expect gratitude in a ball-room?" Laura laughed a little, more in pleasant anticipation of the waltz than at what she said.
"A little more than in the average asylum for the aged and infirm, which most people call home," returned Ghisleri, carelessly.
"You
