The fine gentleman of that day had no taste for the wild, the rugged, or the lonely.  He lived too near the times when those words spelled danger.  He found at Almack’s his most romantic scene, at Ranelagh his terra incognita, in the gardens of Versailles his ideal of the charming and picturesque.  Sir George, no exception to the rule, shivered as he looked round.  He began to experience a revulsion of spirits; and to consider that, for a gentleman who owned Lord Chatham for a patron, and was even now on his roundabout way to join that minister—­for a gentleman whose fortune, though crippled and impaired, was still tolerable, and who, where it had suffered, might look with confidence to see it made good at the public expense—­or to what end patrons or ministers?—­he began to reflect, I say, that for such an one to exchange a peer’s coach and good company for a night trudge at a woman’s heels was a folly, better befitting a boy at school than a man of his years.  Not that he had ever been so wild as to contemplate anything serious; or from the first had entertained the most remote intention of brawling in an unknown cause.  That was an extravagance beyond him; and he doubted if the girl really had it in her mind.  The only adventure he had proposed, when he left the carriage, was one of gallantry; it was the only adventure then in vogue.  And for that, now the time was come, and the incognita and he were as much alone as the most ardent lover could wish, he felt singularly disinclined.

True, the outline of her cloak, and the indications of a slender, well-formed shape which it permitted to escape, satisfied him that the postboy had not deceived him; but that his companion was both young and handsome.  And with this and his bargain it was to be supposed he would be content.  But the pure matter-of-factness of the girl’s manner, her silence, and her uncompromising attitude, as she walked by his side, cooled whatever ardour her beauty and the reflection that he had jockeyed Berkeley were calculated to arouse; and it was with an effort that he presently lessened the distance between them.

‘Et vera incessu patuit dea!’ he said, speaking in the tone between jest and earnest which he had used before. ’"And all the goddess in her step appears.”  Which means that you have the prettiest walk in the world, my dear—­but whither are you taking me?’

She went steadily on, not deigning an answer.

‘But—­my charmer, let us parley,’ he remonstrated, striving to maintain a light tone.  ‘In a minute we shall be in the town and—­’

‘I thought that we understood one another,’ she answered curtly, still continuing to walk, and to look straight before her; in which position her hood, hid her face.  ‘I am taking you where I want you.’

‘Oh, very well,’ he said, shrugging his shoulders.  But under his breath he muttered, ’By heaven, I believe that the pretty fool really thinks—­that I am going to fight for her!’