“Oh, Elsie,” exclaimed Honora, apologetically, “I haven’t read a word of it.”

Mrs. Shorter glanced at the pile of favours.

“How was the dance?” she asked.  “I was too tired to go.  Hugh Chiltern offered to take me.”

“I saw Mr. Chiltern there.  I met him last winter at the Graingers’.”

“He’s staying with us,” said Mrs. Shorter; “you know he’s a sort of cousin of Jerry’s, and devoted to him.  He turned up yesterday morning on Dicky Farnham’s yacht, in the midst of all that storm.  It appears that Dicky met him in New York, and Hugh said he was coming up here, and Dicky offered to sail him up.  When the storm broke they were just outside, and all on board lost their heads, and Hugh took charge and sailed in.  Dicky told me that himself.”

“Then it wasn’t—­recklessness,” said Honora, involuntarily.  But Mrs. Shorter did not appear to be surprised by the remark.

“That’s what everybody thinks, of course,” she answered.  “They say that he had a chance to run in somewhere, and browbeat Dicky into keeping on for Newport at the risk of their lives.  They do Hugh an injustice.  He might have done that some years ago, but he’s changed.”

Curiosity got the better of Honora.

“Changed?” she repeated.

“Of course you didn’t know him in the old days, Honora,” said Mrs. Shorter.  “You wouldn’t recognize him now.  I’ve seen a good deal of men, but he is the most interesting and astounding transformation I’ve ever known.”

“How?” asked Honora.  She was sitting before the glass, with her hand raised to her hair.

Mrs. Shorter appeared puzzled.

“That’s what interests me,” she said.  “My dear, don’t you think life tremendously interesting?  I do.  I wish I could write a novel.  Between ourselves, I’ve tried.  I had Mr. Dewing send it to a publisher, who said it was clever, but had no plot.  If I only could get a plot!”

Honora laughed.

“How would I The Transformation of Mr. Chiltern’ do, Elsie?”

“If I only knew what’s happened to him, and how he’s going to end!” sighed Mrs. Shorter.

“You were saying,” said Honora, for her friend seemed to have relapsed into a contemplation of this problem, “you were saying that he had changed.”

“He goes away for seven years, and he suddenly turns up filled with ambition and a purpose in life, something he had never dreamed of.  He’s been at Grenoble, where the Chiltern estate is, making improvements and preparing to settle down there.  And he’s actually getting ready to write a life of his father, the General—­that’s the most surprising thing!  They never met but to strike fire while the General was alive.  It appears that Jerry and Cecil Grainger and one or two other people have some of the old gentleman’s letters, and that’s the reason why Hugh’s come to Newport.  And the strangest thing about it, my dear,” added Mrs. Shorter, inconsequently, “is that I don’t think it’s a love affair.”