“No, I dare say you didn’t; sly dog, Bellamy; do you know what he did?  I introduced him to the lady when we were up in town together last Christmas.  I was dreadfully hard hit myself, I can assure you, and as soon as my back was turned he went and cut me out of the water—­and turned my adored into Mrs. Bellamy.”

“What are you taking my name in vain about, Mr. Caresfoot?” said a rich, low voice behind them.

“Bless me, Anne, how softly you move, you quite startled me,” said little Mr. Bellamy, putting on his spectacles in an agitated manner.

“My dear, a wife, like an embodied conscience, should always be at her husband’s shoulder, especially when he does not know it.”

Bellamy made no reply, but looked as though the sentiment was one of which he did not approve; meantime the lady repeated her question to George, and the two fell into a bantering conversation.  Philip, having dropped back a little, had an opportunity of carefully observing Mrs. Bellamy, an occupation not without interest, for she was certainly worthy of notice.

About twenty years of age, and of medium height, her figure was so finely proportioned and so roomily made that it gave her the appearance of being taller than she really was.  The head was set squarely on the shoulders, the hair was cut short, and clustered in ringlets over the low, broad brow; whilst the clearly carved Egyptian features and square chin gave the whole face a curious expression of resoluteness and power.  The eyes were heavily-lidded and greyish-green in hue, with enormously large dark pupils that had a strange habit of expanding and contracting without apparent reason.

Gazing at her, Philip was at a loss to know whether this woman so bizarrely beautiful fascinated or repelled him; indeed, neither then nor at any future time did he succeed in deciding the question.  Whilst he was still contemplating, and wondering how Bellamy of all people in the world had managed to marry such a woman, and what previous acquaintance George had had with her, he saw the lady whisper something to his cousin, who at once turned and introduced him.

“Philip,” he said, “let me introduce you to the most charming lady of my acquaintance, Mrs. Bellamy.”

Philip bowed and expressed himself delighted, whilst the lady curtsied with a mixture of grace and dignity that became her infinitely well.

“Your cousin has often spoken to me of you, Mr. Caresfoot, but he never told me——­” here she hesitated, and broke off.

“What did he never tell you, Mrs. Bellamy?  Nothing to my disadvantage, I hope.”

“On the contrary, if you wish to know,” she said, in that tone of flattering frankness which is sometimes so charming in a woman’s mouth, “he never told me that you were young and handsome.  I fancied you forty at least.”

“I should dearly like to tell you, Mrs. Bellamy, what my cousin George never told me; but I won’t, for fear I should make Bellamy jealous.”