“If you could but have seen your face!” she cried.  “I feel tempted to act the charade over again.  Why, Norman, what likeness can you see between Philippa L’Estrange, the proud, cold woman of the world, and that sweet little Puritan maiden at her spinning wheel?”

“I should never have detected any likeness unless you yourself had first pointed it out,” he said.  “Tell me, Philippa, are you really going to make the duke happy at last?”

“It may be that I am going to make him profoundly miserable As punishment for your lecture, I shall refuse to tell you anything about it,” she replied; and then she added:  “You will ride with me this morning, Norman?”

“Yes.  I will ride with you, Philippa.  I cannot tell you how thankful and relieved I am.”

“To find that you have not made quite so many conquests as you thought,” she said.  “It was a sorry jest to play after all; but you provoked me to it, Norman.  I want you to make me a promise.”

“That I will gladly do,” he replied.  Indeed he was so relieved so pleased, so thankful to be freed from the load of self-reproach that he would have promised anything.

Her face grew earnest.  She held out her hand to him.

“Promise me this, Norman,” she said—­“that, whether I remain Philippa L’Estrange or become Duchess of Hazlewood—­no matter what I am, or may be—­you will always be the same to me as you are now—­my brother, my truest, dearest, best friend.  Promise me.”

“I do promise, Philippa, with all my heart,” he responded.  “And I will never break my promise.”

“If I marry, you will come to see me—­you-will trust in me—­you will be just what you are now—­you will make my house your home, as you do this?”

“Yes—­that is, if your husband consents,” replied Lord Arleigh.

“Rely upon it, my husband—­if I ever have one—­will not dispute my wishes,” she said.  “I am not the model woman you dream of.  She, of course, will be submissive in everything; I intend to have my own way.”

“We are friends for life, Philippa,” he declared; “and I do not think that any one who really understands me will ever cavil at our friendship.”

“Then, that being settled, we will go at once for our ride.  How those who know me best would laugh, Norman, if they heard of the incident of the Puritan maiden!  If I go to another fancy ball this season, I shall go as Priscilla of Plymouth and you had better go as John Alden.”

He held up his hands imploringly.

“Do not tease me about it any more, Philippa,” he remarked, “I cannot quite tell why, but you make me feel both insignificant and vain; yet nothing would have been further from my mind than the ideas you have filled it with.”

“Own you were mistaken, and then I will be generous and forgive you,” she said, laughingly.

“I was mistaken—­cruelly so—­weakly so—­happily so,” he replied.  “Now you will be generous and spare me.”