Langholm and the little Miss Gibson were standing close behind, and the trained eye of the habitual observer took in every detail of a scene which he never forgot.  Handsome Mrs. Uniacke was clinching the introduction with a smile, which ended in a swift expression of surprise.  Sir Baldwin had made an extraordinary pause, his hand half way to his hat, his lantern jaws fallen suddenly apart.  Mrs. Steel, though slower at her part of the obvious recognition, was only a second slower, and thereupon stood abashed and ashamed in the eyes of all who saw; but only for another second at the most; then Sir Baldwin Gibson not only raised his hat, but held out his hand in a fatherly way, and as she took it Rachel’s color changed from livid white to ruby red.

Yet even Rachel was mistress of herself so quickly that the one or two eye-witnesses of this scene, such as Mrs. Uniacke and Charles Langholm, who saw that it had a serious meaning, without dreaming what that meaning was, were each in hopes that no one else had seen as much as they.  Sir Baldwin plunged at once into amiable and fluent conversation, and before many moments Rachel’s replies were infected with an approximate assurance and ease; then Langholm turned to his juvenile companion, and put a question in the form of a fib.

“So that is your father,” said he.  “I seem, do you know, to know his face?”

Little Miss Gibson fell an easy prey.

“You probably do; he is the judge, you know!”

“The judge, is he?”

“Yes; and I wanted to ask you something just now in the tent.  Did you mean the Mrs. Minchin who was tried for murder, when you were talking about your plot?”

Langholm experienced an unforeseen shock from head to heel; he could only nod.

“He was the judge who tried her!” the schoolgirl said with pardonable pride.

A lady joined them as they spoke.

“Do you really mean that that is Mr. Justice Gibson, who tried Mrs. Minchin at the Old Bailey last November?”

“Yes—­my father,” said the proud young girl.

“What a very singular thing!  How do you do, Mr. Langholm?  I didn’t see it was you.”

And Langholm found himself shaking hands with the aquiline lady to whom he had talked so little at the Upthorpe dinner-party; she took her revenge by giving him only the tips of her fingers now, and by looking deliberately past him at Rachel and her judge.

CHAPTER XVI

A MATCH FOR MRS. VENABLES

That was absolutely all that happened at the Uniackes’ garden-party.  There was no scene, no scandal, no incident whatsoever beyond an apparently mutual recognition between Mrs. Steel and Mr. Justice Gibson.  Of this there were not half-a-dozen witnesses, all of whom were given immediate reason to suppose that either they or the pair in question had made a mistake; for nothing could have surpassed the presence of mind and the kindness of heart with which Sir Baldwin Gibson chatted to the woman whom he had tried for her life within the year.  And his charity continued behind her back.