Her ladyship’s courage was beyond dispute; but she turned pale as she approached the entrance to the boudoir.

There stood Natalie—­at once angry and afraid—­between the man to whom she was ostensibly engaged, and the man to whom she was actually married.  Turlington’s rugged face expressed a martyrdom of suppressed fury.  Launce—­in the act of offering Natalie her fan—­smiled, with the cool superiority of a man who knew that he had won his advantage, and who triumphed in knowing it.

“I forbid you to take your fan from that man’s hands,” said Turlington, speaking to Natalie, and pointing to Launce.

“Isn’t it rather too soon to begin ’forbidding’?” asked Lady Winwood, good-humoredly.

“Exactly what I say!” exclaimed Launce.  “It seems necessary to remind Mr. Turlington that he is not married to Natalie yet!”

Those last words were spoken in a tone which made both the women tremble inwardly for results.  Lady Winwood took the fan from Launce with one hand, and took Natalie’s arm with the other.

“There is your fan, my dear,” she said, in her easy off-hand manner.  “Why do you allow these two barbarous men to keep you here while the great Bootmann is playing the Nightmare Sonata in the next room?  Launce!  Mr. Turlington! follow me, and learn to be musical directly!  You have only to shut your eyes, and you will fancy you hear four modern German composers playing, instead of one, and not the ghost of a melody among all the four.”  She led the way out with Natalie, and whispered, “Did he catch you?” Natalie whispered back, “I heard him in time.  He only caught us looking for the fan.”  The two men waited behind to have two words together alone in the boudoir.

“This doesn’t end here, Mr. Linzie!”

Launce smiled satirically.  “For once I agree with you,” he answered.  “It doesn’t end here, as you say.”

Lady Winwood stopped, and looked back at them from the drawing-room door.  They were keeping her waiting—­they had no choice but to follow the mistress of the house.

Arrived in the next room, both Turlington and Launce resumed their places among the guests with the same object in view.  As a necessary result of the scene in the boudoir, each had his own special remonstrance to address to Sir Joseph.  Even here, Launce was beforehand with Turlington.  He was the first to get possession of Sir Joseph’s private ear.  His complaint took the form of a protest against Turlington’s jealousy, and an appeal for a reconsideration of the sentence which excluded him from Muswell Hill.  Watching them from a distance, Turlington’s suspicious eye detected the appearance of something unduly confidential in the colloquy between the two.  Under cover of the company, he stole behind them and listened.