"I should like to know who the girl is," he urged. "You have never told me."
"I shall be jealous of her in a few minutes!" exclaimed Philippa "Already she has sundered an old friendship that I thought would last forever; and now, directly you return, you can talk of no one else."
"I should like to see you jealous," said the duke, who was one of the most unsuspicious of men.
She smiled; yet there came to her a sharp, bitter memory of the night on the balcony when she had been jealous of the ideal woman, the unknown love whom Norman had sketched for her.
The duke, however, was pertinacious; he could not give up the subject.
"You told me," he resumed, "that she was the daughter of an old friend of yours named Dornham--and it seems to me, Philippa, that I have some kind of remembrance of that name which is far from pleasant."
With an air of resignation the duchess rose from her seat.
"I am tired, Vere," she said, "quite tired of the subject. Yet I ought not to be selfish. Of course, the incident is all new to you--you have been away from all kinds of news; to us it is an old, worn-out story. Lord Arleigh and I quarreled and parted because of his marriage, so you may imagine it is not a very attractive subject to me."
"Well, I will say no more about it, but I am sincerely sorry, Philippa. Of all our friends, I like Lord Arleigh best; and I shall decidedly refuse to quarrel with him. His marriage is his own affair, not mine."
"Still, you cannot make a friend of the man whom I decline to know," she rejoined, hurriedly.