“I am not going?”

“Why?”

Emilia’s bosom rose.  She cried “Dear lady!” on the fall of it, and was scarce audible—­adding, “Do you love Wilfrid?”

“Well, you have brought me to the point quickly,” Lady Charlotte remarked.  “I don’t commonly beat the bush long myself.  Love him!  You might as well ask me my age.  The indiscretion would be equal, and the result the same.  Love!  I have a proper fear of the word.  When two play at love they spoil the game.  It’s enough that he says he loves me.”

Emilia looked relieved.  “Poor lady!” she sighed.

“Poor!” Lady Charlotte echoed, with curious eyes fixed on the puzzle beside her.

“Tell me you will not believe him,” Emilia continued.  “He is mine; I shall never give him up.  It is useless for you or any one else to love him.  I know what love is now.  Stop while you can.  I can be sorry for you, but I will not let him go from me.  He is my lover.”

Emilia closed her lips abruptly.  She produced more effect than was visible.  Lady Charlotte drew out a letter, saying, “Perhaps this will satisfy you.”

“Nothing!” cried Emilia, jumping to her feet.

“Read it—­read it; and, for heaven’s sake, ma fille sauvage, don’t think I’m here to fight for the man!  He is not Orpheus; and our modern education teaches us that it’s we who are to be run after.  Will you read it?”

“No.”

“Will you read it to please me?”

Emilia changed from a look of quiet opposition to gentleness of feature.  “Why will it please you if I read that he has flattered you?  I never lie about what I feel; I think men do.”  Her voice sank.

“You won’t allow yourself to imagine, then, that he has spoken false to you?”

“Tell me,” retorted Emilia, “are you sure in your heart—­as sure as it beats each time—­that he loves you?  You are not.”

“It seems that we are dignifying my gentleman remarkably,” said Lady Charlotte.  “When two women fight for a man, that is almost a meal for his vanity.  Now, listen.  I am not, as they phrase it, in love.  I am an experienced person—­what is called a woman of the world.  I should not make a marriage unless I had come to the conclusion that I could help my husband, or he me.  Do me the favour to read this letter.”

Emilia took it and opened it slowly.  It was a letter in the tone of the gallant paying homage with some fervour.  Emilia searched every sentence for the one word.  That being absent, she handed back the letter, her eyes lingering on the signature.

“Do you see what he says?” asked Lady Charlotte; “that I can be a right hand to him, as I believe I can.”

“He writes like a friend.”  Emilia uttered this as when we have a contrast in the mind.

“You excuse him for writing to me in that style?”

“Yes; he may write to any woman like that.”

“He has latitude!  You really fancy that’s the sort of letter a friend would write?”