And what was it you said of Mr.Hardinge?
Ah! I _have_ forgotten that, but I know how you extolled him--praised him to the skies--recommended him to me as a desirable suitor." She makes an impatient movement, as if to shake something from her.

"Why have you come to-day ?" asks she.

"To plead his cause afresh ?" "Not his--to-day." "Whose then?
Another suitor, maybe?
It seems I have more than even I dreamt of." "I do not know if you have dreamed of this one," says Curzon, perplexed by her manner.

Some hope had been in his heart in his journey to her, but now it dies.

There is little love truly in her small, vivid face, her gleaming eyes, her parted, scornful lips.
"I am not given to dreams," says she, with a petulant shrug_.