She opened her hand and showed him the diamond pendant.
"'I thought you would come some day,' she said, Yorke, and if you could have seen her face when she said it! 'And so I kept it for you.'"
One day Lord Auchester and his wife, and Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Duncombe were staying at a country house in the North. It was an extremely pleasant party, of which those two ladies were, by general consent, admitted to be the belles, and the hostess, not unnaturally proud of having the famous Lady Auchester under her roof, decided to give a big dance which should include all the neighboring county families and their guests.
Half an hour before the opening of the ball, while Leslie was dressing, the hostess, Lady Springmore, came in to her in a great flush of excitement and distress.
"Oh, my dear Lady Auchester, I am so sorry!" she exclaimed, when Leslie had sent her maid away. "I am heartbroken about it, and I don't know what to do."
"What is it, Lady Springmore?" asked Leslie, more amused than frightened at her hostess' fluster. "Has the floor fallen in, or the ices gone wrong?"
"No, no, my dear! It's—it's something concerning you and Lord Auchester," and she clasped her hands and sank into a chair.
"Then I'd better call my husband," said Leslie, looking toward the next dressing-room, where Yorke was brushing his hair and whistling "like a ploughboy," as Leslie often declared.