to join the dancers; you can come—or stay.” The last words were flung at him over her shoulder, and before he could rise to follow, she had vanished in the throng that was surging to and fro without the alcove. He starts forward as if about to pursue her, and then sinks back upon the couch. “I won’t be a greater fool than nature made me,” he mutters in scornful self-contempt. “If I go, she’ll flirt outrageously under my very nose; if I stay—she’ll flirt all the same, of course. Ah! if a man would have a foretaste of purgatory let him live under the same roof with the woman he loves and the woman he hates!” A shadow comes between his vision and the gleam of light from without, and, lifting his eyes, he encounters two steady orbs gazing out from behind a yellow mask. “Ah!” He half rises again, then sinks back and motions the mask to the seat beside him. “I recognize your costume,” he says, as the British officer seats himself. “How long since you came?” [82]“Only a few moments. I have been waiting for your interview with the lady to end.” [82] “Ah!” with an air of abstraction; then, recalling himself: “Do you know the nature of the work required of you?” Under his mask, Van Vernet’s face flamed and he bit his lip with vexation. This man in black and scarlet, this aristocrat, addressed him, not as one man to another, but loftily as a king to a subject. But there was no sign of annoyance in his voice as he replied: “Um—I suppose so. Delicate bit of a shadowing, I was told; no particulars given.” “There need be no particulars. I will point you out the person to be shadowed. I want you to see her, and be yourself unseen. You are simply to discover,—find out where she goes, who she sees, what she does. Don’t disturb yourself about motives; I only want the facts.” “Ah!” thought Van Vernet; “it’s a she, then.” Aloud, he said: “You have not given the lady’s name?” “You would find it out, of course?” “Of course; necessarily.” “The lady is my—is Mrs. Warburton, the mistress of the house.”
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