It's only making one more acknowledgment of my own folly." "You don't mean a portrait of him!" Lady Loring exclaimed.
"The best that I could do from recollection," Stella answered sadly.
"Bring it here directly!" Stella left the room and returned with a little drawing in pencil.

The instant Lady Loring looked at it, she recognized Romayne and started excitedly to her feet.
"You know him!" cried Stella.
Lady Loring had placed herself in an awkward position.

Her husband had described to her his interview with Major Hynd, and had mentioned his project for bringing Romayne and Stella together, after first exacting a promise of the strictest secrecy from his wife.

She felt herself bound--doubly bound, after what she had now discovered--to respect the confidence placed in her; and this at the time when she had betrayed herself to Stella! With a woman's feline fineness of perception, in all cases of subterfuge and concealment, she picked a part of the truth out of the whole, and answered harmlessly without a moment's hesitation.
"I have certainly seen him," she said--"probably at some party.

But I see so many people, and I go to so many places, that I must ask for time to consult my memory.