Miss Delmaine is tall, slender, posee more or less, while Mrs. Talbot is prettily rounded, petite in every point, and nervously ambitious of winning the regard of the male sex.

During the past week private theatricals have been suggested.  Every one is tired of dancing and music.  The season has given them more than a surfeit of both, and so they have fallen back upon theatricals.

The play on which they have decided is Goldsmith’s famous production, “She Stoops to Conquer.”

Miss Villiers, a pretty girl with yellow hair and charming eyes, is to be Constantia Neville; Miss Delmaine, Kate Hardcastle; Lady Gertrude Vining, though rather young for the part, has consented to play Mrs. Hardcastle, under the impression that she looks well in a cap and powdered hair.  An impossible Tony Lumpkin has been discovered in a nervous young man with a hesitation in his speech and a difficulty about the letter “S”—­a young man who wofully misunderstands Tony, and brings him out in a hitherto unknown character; a suitable Hastings has been found in the person of Captain Ringwood, a gallant young officer, and one of the “curled darlings” of society.

But who is to play Marlow?  Who is to be the happy man, so blessed—­even though in these fictitious circumstances—­as to be allowed to make love to the reigning beauty of the past season?  Nearly every man in the house has thrown out a hint as to his fitness for the part, but as yet no arrangement has been arrived at.

Sir Adrian of course is the one toward whom all eyes—­and some very jealous ones—­are directed.  But his duties as host compel him, sorely against his will, to draw back a little from the proffered honor, and to consult the wishes of his guests rather than his own.  Miss Delmaine herself has laughingly declined to make any choice of a stage lover, so that, up to the present moment, matters are still in such a state of confusion and uncertainty that they have been unable to name any date for the production of their play.

It is four o’clock, and they are all standing or sitting in the library, intent as usual in discussing the difficulty.  They are all talking together, and, in the excitement that prevails, no one hears the door open, or the footman’s calm, introduction of a gentleman, who now comes leisurely up to where Sir Adrian is standing, leaning over Florence Delmaine’s chair.

He is a tall man of about thirty-five, with a dark face and dark eyes, and, withal, a slight resemblance to Sir Adrian.

“Ah, Arthur, is it you!” says Sir Adrian, in a surprised tone that has certainly no cordiality in it, but, just as certainly, the tone is not repellent.

“Yes,” replies the stranger, with a languid smile, and without confusion.  “Yesterday I suddenly recollected the general invitation you gave me a month ago to come to you at any time that suited me best.  This time suits me, and so I have come.”