Ravenshoe. By Henry Kingsley.

ANOTHER MEETING. 271
it was time to go, but that she should come and see Lady Ascot
on the morrow. Then she turned to William, to whom she had
not been introduced, and asked, would he see her to her carriage?
Lord Saltire was next the bell, and, looking her steadily in the
face, raised his hand slowly to pull it. Adelaide begged him
eagerly not to trouble himself; he, with a smile, promptly dropped
his hand, and out she sailed on William's arm, Lord Saltire
holding the door open, and shutting it after her, with somewhat
singular rapidity.
"I hope none of those fools of servants will come blundering
up-stairs before she has said her say, " he remarked aloud. "Give
us some of your South African experiences, Mr. Smith. Did you
ever see a woman beautiful enough to go clip a lion's claws singlehanded, -eh?"
William, convoying Adelaide down-stairs, had got no further
than the first step, when he felt her hand drawn from his arm; he
had got one foot on the step below, when he turned to see the
cause of this. Adelaide was standing on the step above him,
with her glorious face bent sternly, almost fiercely, down on his,
and the hand from which the fan hung pointed towards him. It
was as beautiful a sight as he had ever seen, and he calmly wondered what it meant. The perfect mouth was curved in scorn,
and from it came sharp, ringing words, decisive, hard, clear, like
the sound of a hammer on an anvil.
"Are you a party to this shameful business, sir? you, who
have taken his name, and his place, and his prospects in society.
You, who professed, as I hear, to love him like another life,
dearer than your own. You, who lay on the same breast with
him, -tell me, in God's name, that you are sinning in ignorance."
William, as I have remarked before, had a certain amount of
shrewdness. He determined to let her go on. He only said,
"You are speaking of Charles Ravenshoe."
"Ay," she said, sharply; "of Charles Ravenshoe, sir, - exstable-boy. I came here to-night to beard them all; to ask them,
did they know, and did they dare to suffer it. If they had not
given me an answer, I would have said such things to them as
would have made them stop their ears. Lord Saltire has a biting
tongue, has he? Let him hear what mine is. But, when I saw
you among them, I determined to save a scene, and speak to you
alone. Shameful -"
William looked quietly at her. "Will your ladyship remark
that I, that all of us, have been moving heaven and earth to find
Charles Ravenshoe, and that we have been utterly unable to find
him? If you have any information about him, would it not be as
well to consider that the desperation caused by your treatment of