"You won't, I hope, leave for some time yet?"
"Yes; much as we love it," she answered; smiling, "we go north ere spring has thawed the sceptre out of the frozen hand of winter."
"I am sorry to hear that. But you don't surely go as soon as my friend
Trevalyon?"
Vaura hesitated a moment, not wishing to be a messenger of death at a dinner table, when Trevalyon came to her aid, cutting Mrs. Marchmont short in a dissertation on the merits of shaded wool versus plain, by saying,
"Pardon me, Miss Vernon. I may be obliged, O'Gormon, to leave for
England sooner than I expected; if so, it will be alone."
"One of the penalties of bachelorhood, Trevalyon; by my faith, 'tis a lonely loneliness."
"I thought most of you glory in the freedom of winging your flight when you please, without having to say, by your leave," said Vaura, gaily.
"Not always," said Trevalyon, quietly.
"What do you say, Lady Esmondet. Don't you think a fellow is happier and less lonely when he cuts bachelor life?"
"Depends on the cards in his hands, and how he plays them, Sir
Dennis," answered his host, laconically.