Oke's
expression did not make the jest seem any the less questionable.
"What is that costume?" asked the theatrical cousin, who, after a second,
had come to the conclusion that Mrs. Oke was merely a woman of marvellous
talent whom he must try and secure for his amateur troop next season.
"It is the dress in which an ancestress of ours, my namesake Alice Oke,
used to go out riding with her husband in the days of Charles I.," she
answered, and took her seat at the head of the table. Involuntarily my eyes
sought those of Oke of Okehurst. He, who blushed as easily as a girl of
sixteen, was now as white as ashes, and I noticed that he pressed his hand
almost convulsively to his mouth.
"Don't you recognise my dress, William?" asked Mrs. Oke, fixing her eyes
upon him with a cruel smile.
He did not answer, and there was a moment's silence, which the theatrical
cousin had the happy thought of breaking by jumping upon his seat and
emptying off his glass with the exclamation--
"To the health of the two Alice Okes, of the past and the present!"
Mrs. Oke nodded, and with an expression I had never seen in her face
before, answered in a loud and aggressive tone--
"To the health of the poet, Mr.
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