of course, if you're so certain about it, there's no good in contradicting you. Did you say that lady's name was Floyd? Could I have seen her last week in New York?"
"Quite possible. Perhaps you heard something about her?"
"No," said Barnes, after thinking a moment. "I remember—somebody pointed her out at the opera."
His companion looked at him with a kind of hard amusement. Cecilia Boyson was only five-and-twenty, but there was already something in her that foretold the formidable old maid.
"Well, when people begin upon Daphne Floyd," she said, "they generally go through with it. Ah! here comes Alfred."
Captain Boyson, pushing his way through the throng, announced to his sister and General Hobson that he had found the curator in charge of the house, who sent a message by him to the effect that if only the party would wait till four o'clock, the official closing hour, he himself would have great pleasure in showing them the house when all the tourists of the day had taken their departure.
"Then," said Miss Floyd, smiling at the General, "let us go and sit in the garden, and feel ourselves aristocratic and superior."
The General's brow smoothed. Voice and smile were alike engaging. Their owner was not exactly pretty, but she had very large dark eyes, and a small glowing face, set in a profusion of hair. Her neck, the General thought, was the slenderest he had ever seen, and the slight round lines of her form spoke of youth in its first delicate maturity. He followed her obediently, and they were all soon in the garden again, and free of the crowd. Miss Floyd led the way across the grass with the General.
"Ah! now you will see the General will begin to like us," said Miss Boyson. "Daphne has got him in hand."
Her tone was slightly mocking. Barnes observed the two figures in front of them, and remarked that Miss Floyd had a "very—well—a very foreign look."
"Not English, you mean?—or American? Well, naturally. Her mother was a Spaniard—a South American—from Buenos Ayres. That's why she is so dark, and so graceful."
"I never saw a prettier dress," said Barnes, following the slight figure with his eyes. "It's so simple."
His companion laughed again. The manner of the laugh puzzled her companion, but, just as he was about to put a question, the General and the young lady paused in front, to let the rest of the party come up with them. Miss Floyd proposed a seat a little way down the slope, where they might wait the half-hour appointed.
That half-hour passed quickly for all concerned. In looking back upon it afterwards two of the party were conscious that it had all hung upon one person. Daphne Floyd sat beside the General, who paid her a half-reluctant, half-fascinated attention. Without any apparent effort on her part she became indeed the centre of the group who sat or lay on the grass. All faces were turned towards her, and presently all ears listened for her remarks. Her talk was young and vivacious, nothing more. But all she said came, as it were, steeped in personality, a personality so energetic, so charged with movement and with action that it arrested the spectators—not always agreeably. It was like the passage of a train through the darkness, when, for the moment, the quietest landscape turns to fire and force.
The comparison suggested itself to Captain Boyson as he lay watching her, only to be received with an inward mockery, half bitter, half amused. This girl was always awakening in him these violent or desperate images. Was it her fault that she possessed those brilliant eyes—eyes, as it seemed, of the typical, essential woman?—and that downy brunette skin, with the tinge in it of damask red?—and that instinctive art of lovely gesture in which her whole being seemed to express itself? Boyson, who was not only a rising soldier, but an excellent amateur artist, knew every line of the face by heart. He had drawn Miss Daphne from the life on several occasions; and from memory scores of times. He was not likely to draw her from life any more; and thereby hung a tale. As far as he was concerned the train had passed—in flame and fury—leaving an echoing silence behind it.
What folly! He turned resolutely to Mrs. Verrier, and tried to discuss with her an exhibition of French art recently opened in Washington. In vain. After a few sentences, the talk between them dropped, and both he and she were once more watching Miss Floyd, and joining in the conversation whenever she chose to draw them in.
As for Roger Barnes, he too was steadily subjugated—up to a certain point. He was not sure that he liked Miss Floyd, or her conversation. She was so much mistress of herself and of the company, that his masculine vanity occasionally rebelled. A little flirt!—that gave herself airs. It startled his English mind that at twenty—for she could be no more—a girl should so take the floor, and hold the stage. Sometimes he turned his back upon her—almost; and Cecilia Boyson held him. But, if there was too much of the "eternal womanly" in Miss Floyd, there was not enough in Cecilia Boyson. He began to discover also that she was too clever for him, and was in fact talking down to him. Some of the things that she said to him about New York and Washington puzzled him extremely. She was, he supposed, intellectual; but the intellectual women in England did not talk in the same way. He was equal to them, or flattered himself that he was; but Miss Boyson was beyond him. He was getting into great difficulties with her, when suddenly Miss Floyd addressed him:
"I am sure I saw you in New York, at the opera?"
She bent over to him as she spoke, and lowered her voice. Her look was merry, perhaps a little satirical. It put him on his guard.
"Yes, I was there. You were pointed out to me."
"You were with some old friends of mine. I suppose they gave you an account of me?"
"They were beginning it; but then Melba began to sing, and some horrid people in the next box said 'Hush!'"
She studied him in a laughing silence a moment, her chin on her hand, then said:
"That is the worst of the opera; it stops so much interesting conversation."
"You don't care for the music?"
"Oh, I am a musician!" she said quickly. "I teach it. But I am like the mad King of Bavaria—I want an opera-house to myself."
"You teach it?" he said, in amazement.
She nodded, smiling. At that moment a bell rang. Captain Boyson rose.
"That's the signal for closing. I think we ought to be moving up."
They strolled slowly towards the house, watching the stream of excursionists pour out of the house and gardens, and wind down the hill; sounds of talk and laughter filled the air, and the western sun touched the spring hats and dresses.
"The holidays end to-morrow," said Daphne Floyd demurely, as she walked beside young Barnes. And she looked smiling at the crowd of young women, as though claiming solidarity with them.
A teacher? A teacher of music?—with that self-confidence—that air as though the world belonged to her! The young man was greatly mystified. But he reminded himself that he was in a democratic country where all men—and especially all women—are equal. Not that the young women now streaming to the steamboat were Miss Floyd's equals. The notion was absurd. All that appeared to be true was that Miss Floyd, in any circumstances, would be, and was, the equal of anybody.
"How charming your friend is!" he said presently to Cecilia Boyson, as they lingered on the veranda, waiting for the curator, in a scene now deserted. "She tells me she is a teacher of music."
Cecilia
