She was more than a match for most; and it was not a secret.  Algernon knew it as well as Edward, or any one.  She was a terror to the soul of the youth, and an attraction.  Her smile was the richest flattery he could feel; the richer, perhaps, from his feeling it to be a thing impossible to fix.  He had heard tales of her; he remembered Edward’s warning; but he was very humbly sitting with her now, and very happy.

“I’m in for it,” he said to his fair companion; “no cheque for me next quarter, and no chance of an increase.  He’ll tell me I’ve got a salary.  A salary!  Good Lord! what a man comes to!  I’ve done for myself with the squire for a year.”

“You must think whether you have compensation,” said the lady, and he received it in a cousinly squeeze of his hand.

He was about to raise the lank white hand to his lips.

“Ah!” she said, “there would be no compensation to me, if that were seen;” and her dainty hand was withdrawn.  “Now, tell me,” she changed her tone.  “How do the loves prosper?”

Algernon begged her not to call them ‘loves.’  She nodded and smiled.

“Your artistic admirations,” she observed.  “I am to see her in church, am I not?  Only, my dear Algy, don’t go too far.  Rustic beauties are as dangerous as Court Princesses.  Where was it you saw her first?”

“At the Bank,” said Algernon.

“Really! at the Bank!  So your time there is not absolutely wasted.  What brought her to London, I wonder?”

“Well, she has an old uncle, a queer old fellow, and he’s a sort of porter—­money porter—­in the Bank, awfully honest, or he might half break it some fine day, if he chose to cut and run.  She’s got a sister, prettier than this girl, the fellows say; I’ve never seen her.  I expect I’ve seen a portrait of her, though.”

“Ah!” Mrs. Lovell musically drew him on.  “Was she dark, too?”

“No, she’s fair.  At least, she is in her portrait.”

“Brown hair; hazel eyes?”

“Oh—­oh!  You guess, do you?”

“I guess nothing, though it seems profitable.  That Yankee betting man ‘guesses,’ and what heaps of money he makes by it!”

“I wish I did,” Algernon sighed.  “All my guessing and reckoning goes wrong.  I’m safe for next Spring, that’s one comfort.  I shall make twenty thousand next Spring.”

“On Templemore?”

“That’s the horse.  I’ve got a little on Tenpenny Nail as well.  But I’m quite safe on Templemore; unless the Evil Principle comes into the field.”

“Is he so sure to be against you, if he does appear?” said Mrs. Lovell.

“Certain!” ejaculated Algernon, in honest indignation.

“Well, Algy, I don’t like to have him on my side.  Perhaps I will take a share in your luck, to make it—? to make it?”—­She played prettily as a mistress teasing her lap-dog to jump for a morsel; adding:  “Oh!  Algy, you are not a Frenchman.  To make it divine, sir! you have missed your chance.”