“Are you going to propose to her?” she asked, with a smile.

“No,” he replied; “I am tired of proposing.”

“Well, I don’t think she would accept you,” said Lady Fitzharford, “she has had the most wonderful offers; she has refused Lord Edwin, the Bannerdales’ son and heir, and, I believe, the Duke of Glarn—­”

“I know, I know!” said Howard, more quickly than usual.  “I can hear her on the stairs.  Oh, vanish, my dear lady, an’ you love me!”

Lady Fitzharford had scarcely left the room, laughing, and not a little puzzled, before the servant admitted Ida.  She was pale, and the look of sadness in her eyes was even more palpable than on the preceding night.  She blushed for an instant as she gave her hand to Howard.

“Lady Fitzharford has gone to get her music, Miss Heron,” he said; “she bade me make her excuses; she will be here presently.  It is so good of you to remember our appointment!  When I came to think it over, I was quite ashamed, do you know, at the obtrusive way in which I pressed the subject of my friend, Lord Highcliffe’s condition, upon you.  But mind, though, I do think you would feel interested in his letter.  He has a knack, unintellectual as he is”—­Ida rose readily to the fly again and flashed a momentary glance of indignation at him from her violet eyes—­“a child-like way of describing scenes and incidents in a kind of graphic style which—­What an idiot I am!” he broke off to exclaim, he had been feeling in his pocket; “I have actually left the letter at home!  Please forgive me.  But perhaps you will regard my lapse of memory as affording you a happy escape.”

Ida’s lips trembled and her eyes became downcast.  Disappointment was eloquently depicted on her face.

“No, I am sorry,” she said.  “I—­I should have liked to have seen the letter.”

“Would you really?” he purred, penitently, as she turned away to the window.  “Then I will go and get it; my rooms are only a short distance.”

“Oh, pray, don’t trouble,” she said, so faintly that Howard found it difficult not to smile.

“Not at all,” he said, politely, and left the room.

As he went down the stairs he glanced at his watch, and muttered: 

“Now, if the young idiot isn’t up to time—­”

At that moment there was a knock at the hall-door, the servant opened it, and Stafford entered with a gloomy countenance and a reluctant gait.

“I’ve come,” he said, rather morosely; “though I don’t know why you should have insisted upon my doing so—­or what good it will do me to hear about her,” he added, in a low voice, as they followed the servant up the stairs.

As the man touched the handle of the door, Howard said: 

“Go in, my dear fellow; I’ve left my pocket-handkerchief in my overcoat in the hall:  back in a moment.”

With a frown of annoyance, Stafford hesitated and looked after him; then, with a shrug of his shoulders, he obeyed and entered the room.