“But she is good, Mother.  She has the noblest ideas of charity and kindness and altruism, of the advancement of all that’s good and true in the world, of the attainment of knowledge, of the beauties and consolation of religion.  It’s fine to hear her talk when she’s inspired—­not a bit preachy, you know—­she’s certainly far enough from that—­but more like reading some beautiful poem you can but half understand, or listening to music that makes you wish you were better, whether you take in its full meaning or not.”

This was a long speech for Lady Alice.  Her mother looked at her in amazement.  There certainly must be something out of the ordinary in this peculiar American cousin to wake Alice from her customary languor.

Alice smiled at her mother’s surprise.

“Strange, isn’t it, Mother?” she asked, half ashamed of her unusual enthusiasm.  “But it’s true.  She’d help some good man to be a power in the world.  I feel it so often when she talks.  I didn’t know women ever thought such things as she does.  I-I-I believe we can trust her, Mother, to steer clear of everything!”

“I hope so, Alice; I am sure I hope so, but—­I don’t know.  I am afraid it was a mistake to keep her so much alone.  It gives her more unreal ideas of life than actual contact with the world would have done.”

Opal Ledoux left the window and sauntered down the long drawing-room toward the table where the speakers were sitting.

“What are you talking about?—­me?”

The cousins were surprised and showed it by blushing guiltily.

Opal laughed merrily.

“Dreary subject for a dreary day!  I hope you found it more interesting than I have!” And she stretched her small figure to its utmost height, which was not a bit above five foot, and shrugged her shoulders lazily.

“What are you reading, Opal?” asked Lady Fletcher, in an effort to change the subject, looking with some interest at the volume that the girl carried.

“Don’t ask me—­all twaddle and moonshine!  I ought not to waste my valuable time with such trash.  There isn’t a real character in the book, not one.  When I write a book, and I presume I shall some time, if I live long enough, I shall put people into it who have real flesh and blood in them and who do startling things.  But I’ll have to live it all first!”

“Live the startling things, Opal?  God forbid!”

“Surely!  Why not?”

And Opal dropped listlessly into a chair, tossed the offending book on a table, and taking a cup of tea from the hand of her cousin, began to sip it with an air of languid indifference, which sat strangely on her youthful, almost childlike figure.

“By the way, Alice,” she asked carelessly, “who was the young man who stared at us so rudely last night as we drove away from the theatre?”

“I saw no young man staring, Opal.  Where was he?”

“Why, he stood on the pavement, waiting, I suppose, for his carriage, and as we drove away he looked at me as though he thought I had no right to live, and still less to laugh—­I believe I was laughing—­and as we turned the corner I peeped back through the curtain, and he still stood there in the full glare of the light, staring.  It’s impolite, cousins—­very!  Gentlemen don’t stare at girls in America!”