She answered nothing, but avoided his glance.  He prepared to take his leave—­and on rising from his chair suddenly caught sight of the portrait on the harpsichord.

“I know that face!” he said, quickly,—­“Who is he?”

“He was also a painter—­as great as the one we have just been speaking of,” answered Miss Leigh—­“His name was Pierce Armitage.”

“That’s it!” exclaimed Harrington, with some excitement.  “Of course!  Pierce Armitage!  I knew him!  One of the handsomest fellows I ever saw!  There was an artist, if you like!—­he might have been anything!  What became of him?—­do you know?”

“He died abroad, so it is said”—­and Miss Leigh’s gentle voice trembled a little—­“but nothing is quite certainly known—­”

Harrington turned swiftly to stare eagerly at Innocent.

“Your name is Armitage!” he said—­“and do you know you are rather like him!  Your face reminds me—–­Are you any relative?”

She gave the usual answer—­

“No.”

“Strange!” He bent his eyes scrutinisingly upon her.  “I remember I thought the same thing when I first met you—­and his features are not easily forgotten!  You have his eyes—­and mouth,—­you might almost be his daughter!”

Her breath quickened—­

“I wish I were!” she said.

He still looked puzzled.

“No—­don’t wish for what would perhaps be a misfortune!” he said—­ “You’ve done very well for yourself!—­but don’t be romantic!  Keep that old ‘French knight’ of yours in the pages of an old French chronicle!—­shut the volume,—­lock it up,—­and—­lose the key!”

CHAPTER III

Some weeks later on, when the London season was at its height, and Fashion, that frilled and furbelowed goddess, sat enthroned in state, controlling the moods of the Elect and Select which she chooses to call “society,” Innocent was invited to the house of a well-known Duchess, renowned for a handsome personality, and also for an unassailable position, notwithstanding certain sinister rumours.  People said—­people are always saying something!—­that her morals were easy-going, but everyone agreed that her taste was unimpeachable.  She—­this great lady whose rank permitted her to entertain the King and Queen—­heard of “Ena Armitage” as the brilliant author whose books were the talk of the town, and forthwith made up her mind that she must be seen at her house as the “sensation” of at least one evening.  To this end she glided in her noiseless, satin-cushioned motor brougham up to the door of Miss Leigh’s modest little dwelling and left the necessary slips of pasteboard bearing her titled name, with similar slips on behalf of her husband the Duke, for Miss Armitage and Miss Leigh.  The slips were followed in due course by a more imposing and formal card of invitation to a “Reception and Small Dance.  R.S.V.P.”  On receiving this, good old Miss Lavinia was a little fluttered and excited, and turning it over and over in her hand, looked at Innocent with a kind of nervous anxiety.