"How could he, when you devoted yourself in such a provokingly open manner to that ridiculous boy, and afterwards allowed Captain Jenkins to monopolize you exclusively? I wish, Bebe, you would not."
"Indeed I shall," says Miss Beatoun, petulantly, "I shall flirt as hard as ever I can with every one I meet. He shall not think I am dying of chagrin and disappointment."
"And will you not even speak to Lord Chandos?"
"Not if I can help it. So you need not say another word. If you do, I will report you to Marmaduke as a dangerous little match-maker, and perhaps marry Captain Jenkins. I have really met more disagreeable men. And as for Chips," says Bebe, who has seemingly recovered all her wonted gayety, "that boy is the most amusing thing I know. He is perfectly adorable. And so handsome as he is, too! It is quite a pleasure alone to sit and look at him."
"Are you going away now?" seeing her rise.
"Yes; it is all hours, or, rather small hours, and Marmaduke will be here in a moment to scold me for keeping you from your beauty-sleep. Good night, dearest, and forget what a goose I made of myself. Promise me."
"I cannot promise to forget what I never thought," I reply, giving her a good hug, and so we part for some hours.
Still, I do not go to bed. Her story has affected me deeply, and sets me pondering. I have seen so little real bona fide sentiment in my home life that probably it interests me in a greater degree than it would most girls of my own age differently reared. I sit before my fire, my hands clasped round my knees, for half an hour, cogitating as to ways and means of reuniting my friend to her beloved—for that Lord Chandos has ceased to regard her with feelings of ardent affection is a thing I neither can nor will believe.
I am still vaguely planning, when Marmaduke, coming in, orders me off to my slumbers, declaring my roses will degenerate into lilies if I persist in keeping such dissipated hours.