The maid’s face fell.

“I packed some of them this morning, miss—­in the large American trunk.  I thought they’d keep better there than anywhere.  It took a lot of time.”

“Oh, never mind.  You can easily pack them again.  I really must go through them.”

The maid unwillingly obeyed; and soon the room—­bed, sofa, chairs—­was covered with costly gowns, for all hours of the day and night:  walking-dresses, in autumn stuffs and colors, ready for the moors and stubbles; afternoon frocks of an elaborate simplicity, expensively girlish; evening dresses in an amazing variety of hue and fabric; with every possible adjunct in the way of flowers, gloves, belt, that dressmakers and customer could desire.

Alicia looked at it all with glowing cheeks.  She reflected that she had really spent the last check she had made her father give her to very great Advantage.  There were very few people of her acquaintance, girls or married women, who knew how to get as much out of money as she did.

In her mind she ran over the list of guests invited to the Eastham party, as her new friend Lady Evelyn had confided it to her.  Nothing could be smarter, but the competition among the women would be terribly keen.  “Of course, I can’t touch duchesses,” she thought, laughing to herself, “or American millionaires.  But I shall do!”

And her mind ran forward in a dream of luxury and delight.  She saw herself sitting or strolling in vast rooms amid admiring groups; mirrors reflected her; she heard the rustle of her gowns on parquet or marble, the merry sound of her own laughter; other girls threw her the incense of their envy and imitation; and men, fresh and tanned from shooting, breathing the joy of physical life, devoted themselves to her pleasure, or encircled her with homage.  Not always chivalrous, or delicate, or properly behaved—­these men of her imagination!  What matter?  She loved adventures!  And moving like a king among the rest, she saw the thin, travel-beaten, eccentric form of Lord Philip—­the hated, adored, pursued; Society’s idol and bugbear all in one; Lord Philip, who shunned and disliked women; on whom, nevertheless, the ambitions and desires of some of the loveliest women in England were, on that account alone, and at this moment of his political triumph, the more intently and the more greedily fixed.

A flash of excitement ran through her.  In Lady Evelyn’s letter of that morning there was a mention of Lord Philip.  “I told him you were to be here.  He made a note of it, and I do at last believe he won’t throw us over, as he generally does.”

She dressed, still in a reverie, speechless under her maid’s hands.  Then, as she emerged upon the gallery, looking down upon the ugly hall of Tallyn, she remembered that she had promised to go back after dinner and read to Oliver.  Her nature rebelled in a moral and physical nausea, and it was all she could do to meet Lady Lucy at their solitary dinner with her usual good temper.