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Starting Out with Python 4e (Gaddis)
Chapter 1 Introduction to Computers and Programming

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tion) 4th Edition
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TRUE/FALSE

1. A software developer is the person with the training to design, create, and test computer programs.

ANS: T

2. A computer is a single device that performs different types of tasks for its users.

ANS: F

3. All programs are normally stored in ROM and are loaded into RAM as needed for processing.

ANS: F

4. The instruction set for a microprocessor is unique and is typically understood only by the
microprocessors of the same brand.

ANS: T

5. The CPU understands instructions written in a binary machine language.

ANS: T

6. A bit that is turned off is represented by the value -1.

ANS: F

7. The main reason to use secondary storage is to hold data for long periods of time, even when the
power supply to the computer is turned off.

ANS: T

8. RAM is a volatile memory used for temporary storage while a program is running.

ANS: T

9. The Python language uses a compiler which is a program that both translates and executes the
instructions in a high-level language.
 ANS: F

10. IDLE is an alternative method to using a text editor to write, execute, and test a Python program.

ANS: T

MULTIPLE CHOICE

1. Programs are commonly referred to as

a. system software
b. software
c. application software
d. utility programs
ANS: B

2. Which of the following is considered to be the world's first programmable electronic computer?
a. IBM
b. Dell
c. ENIAC
d. Gateway
ANS: C

3. Where does a computer store a program and the data that the program is working with while the
program is running?
a. in main memory
b. in the CPU
c. in secondary storage
d. in the microprocessor
ANS: A

4. What type of volatile memory is usually used only for temporary storage while running a program?
a. ROM
b. TMM
c. RAM
d. TVM
ANS: C

5. Which of the following is not a microprocessor manufacturing company?

a. Intel
b. Dell
c. AMD
d. Motorola
ANS: B

6. Which computer language uses short words known as mnemonics for writing programs?
a. Assembly
 b. Java
c. Pascal
d. Visual Basic
ANS: A

7. The process known as the __________ cycle is used by the CPU to execute instructions in a program.
a. decode-fetch-execute
b. decode-execute-fetch
c. fetch-decode-execute
d. fetch-execute-decode
ANS: C

8. Which language is referred to as a low-level language?

a. C++
b. Assembly language
c. Java
d. Python
ANS: B

9. The following is an example of an instruction written in which computer language?

10110000
a. Assembly language
b. Java
c. machine language
d. C#
ANS: C

10. The encoding technique used to store negative numbers in the computer's memory is called
a. Unicode
b. ASCII
c. floating-point notation
d. two's complement
ANS: D

11. The __________ coding scheme contains a set of 128 numeric codes that are used to represent
characters in the computer's memory.
a. Unicode
b. ASCII
c. ENIAC
d. two's complement
ANS: B

12. The smallest storage location in a computer's memory is known as a

a. byte
b. ketter
c. switch
 d. bit
ANS: D

13. What is the largest value that can be stored in one byte?
a. 255
b. 128
c. 8
d. 65535
ANS: A

14. The disk drive is a secondary storage device that stores data by __________ encoding it onto a
spinning circular disk.
a. electrically
b. magnetically
c. digitally
d. optically
ANS: B

15. A __________ has no moving parts and operates faster than a traditional disk drive.
a. DVD drive
b. solid state drive
c. jumper drive
d. hyper drive
ANS: B

16. Which of the following is not a major component of a typical computer system?
a. the CPU
b. main memory
c. the operating system
d. secondary storage devices
ANS: C

17. Which type of error prevents the program from running?

a. syntax
b. human
c. grammatical
d. logical
ANS: A

18. What is the decimal value of the following binary number?

10011101
a. 157
b. 8
c. 156
d. 28
ANS: C
MULTIPLE RESPONSE

1. Select all that apply. To create a Python program you can use
a. a text editor
b. a word processor if you save your file as a .docx
c. IDLE
d. Excel
ANS: A, C

COMPLETION

1. A(n) ___________ is a set of instructions that a computer follows to perform a task.

ANS: program

2. The term ___________ refers to all the physical devices that make up a computer.

ANS: hardware

3. The __________ is the part of the computer that actually runs programs and is the most important
component in a computer.

ANS: central processing unit, CPU

4. A disk drive stores data by __________ encoding it onto a circular disk.

ANS: magnetically

5. __________ are small central processing unit chips.

ANS: Microprocessors

6. __________ is a type of memory that can hold data for long periods of time, even when there is no
power to the computer.

ANS: Secondary storage

7. Main memory is commonly known as __________.

ANS: random-access memory, RAM

8. USB drives store data using __________ memory.

ANS: flash

9. The Python __________ is a program that can read Python programming statements and execute them.

ANS: interpreter
10. In __________ mode, the interpreter reads the contents of a file that contains Python statements and
executes each statement.

ANS: script
Other documents randomly have
different content
quiet, even happy, in Mrs. Hammond's employment, though I soon
perceived her to be the most worthless of her sex. That, however,
troubled me little; and when Sir Charles came to the house and
recognized me, and I said a few words to him which were not
pleasant to hear, and I saw that he was in the toils, as--he had so
often been before, I did not much care either. I disliked and despised
him, and I liked to think of the hidden weapon in my possession,
and to picture his amazement if he knew that not only was I Lizzie
Ponsford,--acquainted with all his doings and all his disreputable
associates,--but that I actually held in my possession the document
for which he would have given so large a price, and which would
have ruined him at any moment. I liked to know that my presence
made him uncomfortable, and I suffered him to experience that
discomfort to the fullest extent.

"You are shocked, Lady Mitford; such feelings are incomprehensible

to you but I tell you simply and plainly that they were mine, because
I am coming to the portion of lay story which concerns you. I went
to Redmoor with Mrs. Hammond, and on the first evening of our visit
I saw that you were suspicious and uneasy. I saw you, Lady Mitford;
I observed you closely, and I loved you; not so much as I did
afterwards, when every day brought some gift, some grace, some
beauty of your mind and disposition freshly before me; not so much
as I did when your sweet gentleness, your kindly courtesy, your
unfailing consideration filled me with sentiments which I had never
known before, when for the first time I learned what it was to be
cared for as an individual. Do you remember the day you took me to
your dressing-room, Lady Mitford, and lent me some of your
favourite books, and talked with me of what kind of reading I liked,
and showed an interest in me, as if I had been a lady and one of
your most considered guests? No, you do not remember it, but I do.
Then I determined to use the power I had over him on your behalf. I
knew it would not avail long; I knew if even he were rescued from
her, he never could realize your hopes, never could be worthy of
you; but at least I could control him for the time. I tried and
succeeded. I threatened him with exposure if he did not desist. I
cannot tell you exactly the course of subsequent events; I have
never been able to make that out to my own satisfaction; but I have
a theory which I think is a right one. A few days after I had the
interview I have mentioned with Sir Charles, a man appeared who
had been mixed up in many of the transactions of the time past to
which I had been a party. He met me, und told me a story which I
did not believe, but which altered my position completely. He had
come down to get me away; and whether he came as Sir Charles's
employé or on his own account, I have never been certain. I believe
the latter to be the more likely. He had two alternatives at his
command: he might expose me if I refused to leave Redmoor
quietly, and destroy all my hopes of attaining respectability in future,
or he might take the bill from me by force or fraud, if I yielded to his
threats. I did neither; I temporized; I made an appointment with
him for two o'clock on the following day, and I left Redmoor, without
clue by which I could be tracked, at daybreak. Let who would be the
author of Mr. Effingham's proceeding (he called himself Effingham), I
had balked their scheme, and I turned my back on Redmoor with
one bitter pang of regret mingled with my triumph. I should see your
face, Lady Mitford, no more, and I could no longer interfere to
prevent the deadly wrong which was being done by your faithless
husband and your false friend.

"All such regrets were, however, utterly vain. The imminent risk of
exposure left me no choice. At least I would punish Sir Charles so
far: he should never have the bill--he should never have the
satisfaction of feeling that that ghost was laid. So I left the only
place in which I had ever tasted happiness, and set my face to the
hard world again. But before I stole away from your house that
morning, I wrote a line to Colonel Alsager, and told him to take up
the watch I had been obliged to relinquish. You are astonished, Lady
Mitford; and well you may be. I had never exchanged more than a
dozen sentences with Colonel Alsager; but I knew that the interest
he felt in you was in no way inferior to mine; while his opportunities
of exhibiting it were infinitely greater, and so I wrote to him."
"What did you do, Miss Gillespie, when you left Redmoor? I fear you
had very little money. Forgive me if I offend you, but I gathered that
from something Mrs. Hammond said."

"You are right, Lady Mitford; and it is like you to think of a need
which you have never known. I had very little money; but I had a
friend who put me in the way of earning some--how, I will tell you
when I have finished the portion of my story in which you are
interested."

The gentle look of forbearance and compassion in Georgie's face

seemed to touch Miss Gillespie very deeply. Once more she took her
hand and kissed it. Then she continued:

"I went to America, and for a long time I heard nothing of you,
though I longed most ardently to do so. The echoes of the great
world did not reach me in the distant sphere of my toil, and I longed
to know how the only person with whom I had ever felt true human
sympathy was wearing through her day. This may seem to you an
unnatural and overstrained sentiment; and so it would be in the
mind of any one who had any natural ties, or who was less desolate
than I; but you must be able to comprehend my life before you
could understand these inconsistencies. Let me leave this, then,
unexplained, and tell you that I came back to England, and that I
have heard all that has befallen you since I went away. I have never
felt anything that has happened to myself in my vagabond life so
much. Incidents I heard, but no one could tell me anything of you
individually,--of how you were bearing your trials, of what face you
showed the world, which would coldly criticise you--a creature as far
beyond its comprehension as any angel in the heaven far beyond
their sphere."

She spoke with intense feeling, and her fine face glowed with the
depth of her sympathy and admiration.

"At last I caught sight of Colonel Alsager."

Georgie blushed, but her visitor did not appear to observe her
emotion.

"I knew he could tell me what I thirsted to know, and I went to his
hotel on the following day, but failed to see him; and when I sent a
note, asking him to let me speak a few words with him, it was
returned. Colonel Alsager had left town. I learned that his father was
dead, and he, of course, a baronet now; but I heard nothing further-
-no one could tell me if his absence were likely to be prolonged. I
had the strongest, the most insatiable desire to see you, Lady
Mitford. I wanted to see the face that I had never forgotten, and
find it as beautiful, as good as ever."

Georgie smiled sadly "Ah, Miss Gillespie, I have suffered much, and
am greatly changed."

"Only for the better," she said eagerly; "only for the better. Every line
in your face is lighted up with spiritual light now. When I saw it last,
the girlish softness had not left the features and given the
expression fair play."

Her enthusiasm--her feeling--were so real, and there was such a

strong dash of the artist in her remarks, that it would have been
impossible to resent them. Lady Mitford once more smiled sadly.

"I knew there was no chance that I should see you in any public
place--your deep mourning precluded that possibility--and so I
resolved to come here and present myself boldly before you. In the
ordinary sense of society, between you and me there is a gulf fixed;
but I thought your gentleness would span it. It has done so. You
have permitted me to speak to you face to face; you have gratified
the wish which another might have resented as mere insolent
curiosity."

"Why do you speak thus, Miss Gillespie? Why should there be a gulf
between you and me? I am not aware of any reason. I do not
despise you because you are a governess, because you use the
talents and the education you possess to earn an honourable
livelihood. Why do you speak thus?"

Miss Gillespie looked at her, and an expression of deep suffering

crossed her face.

"I will explain my meaning presently," she said; "but now I have
something else to say. Is it true that Sir Charles Mitford has followed
this woman to Baden? They say so at the clubs, and I heard it this
morning. Pardon me, and tell me. I don't ask the question for my
own sake, or out of idle curiosity. I have a serious, a most serious
meaning."

"Yes, it is too true," said Lady Mitford.

"Then listen. He must be brought back: he is only gone to

mortification and ridicule. I know a great many queer people, and I
hear a great many strange things; and I heard this to-day: Mrs.
Hammond is going to marry the Russian Prince Tchernigow, a man
who is a violent, jealous, brutal wretch,--I know all about him,--a
man whose cruelty and vindictiveness are not to be surpassed; her
punishment is in safe hands Dear Lady Mitford, I understand that
look. You don't wish her to be punished, I am sure--quite sure of
that; but if she marries Tchernigow, she must be. But it is not with
that we are concerned: it is to bring him home--to rescue him from
danger and disgrace and ridicule, for your sake; and you can do it--
you, and you only."

Georgie was breathless with astonishment. Miss Gillespie rose and

caught her by both hands. Then she went on speaking with great
rapidity:

"Yes, I say you can do it. Write to him to-day--now, this very hour-
and tell him Lizzie Ponsford has been with you; that she holds the
bill which he employed that poor wretch Effingham to get for him;
that Effingham cheated him from first to last--from the time of the
Albatross till the day he went to the bottom of the sea with the
Pocahontas. Tell him he shall have it placed in his hands on the day
he returns to London. Your letter will reach him when he has learned
the faithlessness of the woman for whom he has betrayed you. Do
you not think it will touch him, written as you will write it,--with the
gentleness, the pity, the pardon it will convey? At the moment of his
greatest exasperation, in the full tide of his bitterness, a way of
escape from one constant, overhanging, torturing cause of
uneasiness will be removed; and by whose hands? Yours!"

She paused, breathless in her excitement, and took from her bosom
a paper, which she laid on the table before Lady Mitford, who looked
at it pale and trembling.

"You will do as I say, dear Lady Mitford--you will do it for his sake,
and your own, and for mine? Let me have the satisfaction of
knowing that I have been able to do this service for you--the only
service I have ever done any one; the only one. I fear, I have ever
wished to do."

"O no, don't say that," said Lady Mitford. "You misjudge yourself; I
am sure you do, dear Miss Gillespie, or why should you have felt so
much for me, and done me such a service? Do not write hard things
against yourself. I will do this--it may succeed; but whether it
succeeds or not, I shall ever be grateful to you, ever bless you for
this act; and you will let me serve you in turn--you will tell me your
wishes, and let me try to carry them out. You said you would tell me
how you have been engaged since you left Redmoor."

"Thank you, dear Lady Mitford," said Miss Gillespie, in a low deep
tone; "but you cannot serve me. I told you there was a gulf fixed
between you, the patrician lady, and me. I am an actress, and my
stage-name is Constance Greenwood."

Lady Mitford wrote the letter to Sir Charles, as her strange visitor
had counselled her to do. She suffered much in writing it; she hoped
much from its effect. Time rolled on, and she knew that Sir Charles
must have received the letter; then she counted the days which
must elapse before the answer could arrive, and, arming herself with
patience, she waited.

CHAPTER XXXI.

AMONG THE SPRINGS.

It was the month of September, and the little town of Baden was
full. It is now the big town of Baden, and is still, during its season,
filled to overflowing; but the company is by no means so select, so
pleasant, so agreeable as it used to be. The vor-eisenbahn Baden
was as superior to the present excursionists' resort as was the ante-
railway Ascot Meeting to what now is merely a succession of Derby-
days in Bucks. Then, when you posted in from Strasburg, or arrived
in the eilwagen, from deadly-lively Carlsruhe, you found Mr.
Rheinboldt, the landlord of the Badischer Hof, attended by the
stoutest, the best-tempered, and the stupidest even of German
porters, coming forward to meet you with the pleasantest of
greetings. You had written on beforehand if you were a wise man,
and your old room was ready--one of that little row of snug
dormitories set apart for bachelors, and looking on to the trim
garden. You had a wash, with more water than you had met with
since you left home (they were beginning to understand the English
mania for soap-and-water at the Badischer Hof even so long ago),
and you made your toilette and came down to the five-o'clock table-
d'hôte, where you found most of the people who had been there the
previous season, and many of their friends whom they had induced
to come. Most of the people knew each other or of each other, and
there was a sociability among them which the railway has utterly
annihilated. Now London sends her bagmen and Paris her lorettes;
but in those days, if "our Mr. Johnson" got as far as Parry by way of
Cally or Bolong, he was looked upon as an intrepid voyager, while
very few Parisian ladies, save those of the best class, came into the
Grand Duke's territory.

It was hot in England in that September, but it was hotter at Baden.

With the earliest dawn came thick vapours rolling down from the
Black Forest, encompassing the little town with a white and misty
shroud, which invariably presaged a sultry day, and invariably kept
its promise. All day long the big red-faced sun glared down upon the
denizens of the pleasantest corner of Vanity Fair; glared in the early
morning upon the water-drinkers sipping the nauseous fluid in the
thick and heavy glass tumblers, and tendering their kreutzers to the
attendant maidens at the Brunnen; glared upon them as they took
the prescribed constitutional walk, and returned to the hotel to
breakfast; glared upon the fevered gamblers, who, with last night's
excitement only half slept off, with bleared eyes and shaking hands
and parched throats, took their places round the gaming-table as the
clock struck noon, and eyed the stolid-faced croupiers as intently as
though the chances of the game were to be gleamed from a perusal
of their fishy eyes or pursed mouths. The revellers who were starting
off for picnics to the Black Forest, or excursions to the Favourite or
Eberstein-Schloss, glanced up with terror at the scorching red ball in
the sky, and bade courteous Mr. Rheinboldt, the landlord of the
Badischer Hof, to see that plenty of ice was packed with the
sparkling Moselle, and to let Karl and Fritz take care that an
unlimited supply of umbrellas was placed in the carriage. The
Englishmen, whom M. Benazet, the proprietor of the gaming-tables,
grateful for their patronage, had provided with shooting, or who had
received invitations to the triebjagd of some neighbouring
landowner, looked with comic wonder, not unmixed with horror, at
the green jerkins, fantastic game-bags, couteaux de chasse or
hunting-knives (worn in the belt), and general appearance of their
foreign friends; and then when lunch-time arrived, and they saw
each German eating his own sausage and drinking from his own
particular flask, which he never dreamed of passing, they recollected
with dismay the luncheons at similar parties in England, the snowy
cloth laid under the shade of the hedge, the luscious game-pie, the
cooling claret-cup, the glancing eyes and natty ankles of those who
had accompanied the luncheon. Hot! It was no word for it. It was
blazing, tearing, drying, baking, scorching heat, and it was hotter at
Baden than anywhere else.

So they said at least, and as they were from almost every part of the
civilized world, they ought to have known. There were English
people, swells, peers and peeresses, bankers and bankeresses, a
neat little legal set,--Sir Nisey and Lady Prious, Mr. Tocsin, Q.C., Mr.
Serjeant Stentor, and some of the junior members of the bar,--a
select assortment of the Stock-Exchange, and some eligible young
men from the West-end government offices. There were joyous
Russians, whose names all ended in "vitch" and "gorod," and were
otherwise utterly unpronounceable, who spoke all European
languages with equal fluency and facility, and who put down
rouleaux of Napoleons on the roulette-table where other people
staked thalers or florins. There were a few Frenchmen and French
ladies; here was an Austrian gross-herzog or grand-duke, there
some Prussian cavalry subalterns who could not play at the table
because they had spent the half-crown of their daily allowance in
roast veal, Bairisch beer, and a horrible compound called "grogs an
rhum," which they drank at night, "after," as they said to
themselves, "the English fashion."

It had been hotter than ever during the day, but the day was happily
past and over, and the moon was streaming on the broad gravelled
Platz in front of the Conversationshaus, and the band, stationed in
the little oil-lamp-illumined kiosk, were rattling away at Strauss's
waltzes and Labitskey's galops. The gamblers were already
thronging the roulette and trente-et-quarante tables; and of the non-
gamblers all such as had ladies with them were promenading and
listening to the music, while the others were seated, drinking and
smoking. It was a splendid evening; the diners at the late tables-
d'hôte were wending their way from their hotels to the promenade;
the consumers of the German mittagsessen, were listening to the
band in delicious anticipation of the reh-braten and the haring-salad
and the bok-bier, or the Ahrbleichart, at which another half-hour
would see them hard at work; the clamouring for coffee was
incessant, and the head-waiter, Joseph, who was so like Bouffé, was
almost driven out of his wits by the Babel of voices. They chattered,
those tall occupants of the little wooden round-tables--how they
chattered! They turned round and stared at the promenaders, and
made their comments on them after they had passed. They had
something to say, some remark, either complimentary or
disparaging, to make upon all the ladies. But there was only one
man who seemed to attract any special attention, and that was the
Russian Prince Tchernigow.

A man of middle height, with brown-black hair, a perfectly bloodless

complexion, stern deeply sunken eyes, a stiff moustache bristling
over a determined mouth. A man with small hands and feet, and
apparently but little muscular development, but strong, brave, and
vindictive. A man whose face Lavater might have studied for months
without getting beyond the merest rudiments of his science--
impassive, unaltering, statuesque. He never played but with
rouleaux of napoleons--twenty in a rouleau; and though the space in
front of him was shining with gold at one moment, or laid bare by
the sweeping rake of the croupier,--winning or losing, his expression
would not change for an instant. He had been to Baden for two or
three seasons running, and was beginning to be looked upon as an
habitué; the croupiers acknowledged his taking his seat, intending to
do battle, by a slight grave bow; he had broken the bank more than
once, and was a lion among the visitors, and notably amongst the
English. Tchernigow's horses and carriages, his bold play, his good
shooting, the wonderful way in which he spoke our language, his
love of solitude, his taciturnity, his singular physique, were all freely
discussed at the late tables-d'hôte of hotels at which the prince was
not staving. His reputation of beau joueur caused him to be followed
as soon as he was seen going into the rooms, and his play was
watched and humbly imitated by scores. He seldom attended the
balls, and very rarely danced, though he valsed to perfection; and all
the women in the room were eager for his selection. His appearance
on the promenade always excited attention, but he never gave the
smallest sign of having observed it.

Among those who looked up as Prince Tchernigow passed was Lord

Dollamore, who was seated at one of the tables, with no companion
save his invariable one--his stick. Dollamore generally came to Baden
every year. The place amused him; it was a grand field for the
display of the worst passions of human nature,--a study which
always afforded him infinite delight. He never played, but he was
constantly hovering round the tables; and there was scarcely an
incident which happened in the seething crowd, scarcely a change
which swept across the faces of the leading actors, that passed
unnoticed by him. He did not dance; he would have been prevented
by his lameness from indulging in such a pastime, even had his taste
impelled him to it; but he was a constant attendant at the balls
which M. Benazet provided for the amusement of his patrons; and
looking on at the actual life before him as he might have looked on
the mimic life of a theatrical representation, he had innumerable
conferences with his stick on all he saw and heard, and on the
arguments which he deduced therefrom. He immensely enjoyed
being seated, as he was then, in the calm autumnal moonlit evening,
with a cup of excellent coffee by his side, a cigar in his mouth, and
the ever-shifting panorama of human faces passing before him.

"That Tchernigow is really delicious!" he said to himself--or to his

stick--as he looked after the Russian, and marked the excitement
which he created; "there's a savage insolence about him which is
positively refreshing in these days of bowing and scraping and
preposterous politeness. How they chatter, and gape, and nudge
each other with their elbows about him! and what a supreme
indifference he affects to it all! Affects? Yes, mon prince, it is
accepted as the real thing by these good people, but we are not to
be taken in by veneer, nous autres! It would require a very small
scratch indeed to pick off the Petersburg-cum-Paris polish, and to
arrive at the genuine Calmuck substratum. Only to look at you to tell
that Nature's handwriting never lies; and if ever there were a more
delightfully truculent, ruffianly, bloodthirsty savage than yourself,
mon prince, I am very much out in my ideas. God help the woman
on whom you ever get a legitimate hold! Ah, that reminds me--what
has become of the widow? There is no doubt that Tchernigow was
badly hit in London. The only man received at her house, the only
man permitted to assuage her grief, to wipe away those tears which
doubtless flowed so constantly for poor Percy Hammond! What an
audacious little devil it is! How pluckily she fought that business of
guardianship to the child; and how gracefully she retired from the
contest when she saw that she had no chance, and that defeat was
inevitable! She's the cleverest woman, in a certain way, that I've
ever met with; and I'd take my oath she's playing some long-
headed, far-sighted game now, and that Tchernigow is the stake. No
more flirtation and coquetry--for the present--les eaux sont bases;
the widow is hard up, and means to recoup herself by a rich
marriage. That's why that infatuated cad Mitford was snubbed so
severely. I think she comprehends that Tchernigow will stand no
nonsense, and as he is the parti at present in view, his will is law.
She can't have given up the chase; but how on earth is she working
it?"

A smart natty-looking little man in evening-dress, with smoothly-

brushed hair and elaborately-trimmed whiskers, faint pink coral
studs, little jean boots with glazed tips, irreproachable gloves, and a
Gibus hat--a little man who looked as if he had just stepped out of a
bandbox--stopped at Lord Dollamore's table, and with a bow, half-
deferential, half-familiar, glided into the vacant chair.

"Ah, how do you do, Mr. Aldermaston?" said Lord Dollamore, looking
up,--"how do you do? and what is the latest news in this Inferno?"
Every one who knew Mr. Aldermaston made a point of asking him
the news, well knowing that they could apply to no better source for
the latest gossip and tittle-tattle. Mr. Aldermaston nominally was
private secretary to Lord Waterhouse, the First Commissioner at the
Inland, Irrigation Office, and he had been selected for that onerous
post for his distinguished personal appearance and his obsequious
toadyism. It was not a situation involving a great deal of work,
though any one noticing the regularity with which a large leather
despatch-box, bearing a gilt crown, and "Charles Aldermaston, Esq.,
P.S., I.I.O.," was deposited for him by an official messenger in the
hall of the Alfred Club, might have thought otherwise. The inferior
portion of the duty was performed by a clerk, and Mr. Aldermaston
contented himself with taking Lord Waterhouse's signature to a few
papers occasionally, and receiving a select few of the most
distinguished persons who wished for personal interviews. This left
him plenty of leisure to pursue his more amusing occupation of
purveyor of gossip and inventor and retailer of scandal. In these
capacities he was without a rival. He always knew everything; and if
he did not know it, he invented it, which in some respects was
better, as it enabled him to flavour his anecdotes with a piquancy
which was perhaps wanting in the original. He found occupation for
his ears and tongue in a variety of topics; the heaviest subjects were
not excluded, the lightest obtained a place in his répertoire. The
rumour of the approaching change in the premiership, while passing
through the Aldermaston crucible, encountered the report of
Mademoiselle de la Normandie's refusal to dance her pas seul before
Madame Rivière; the report of Lady Propagand's conversion to
Romanism did not prevent Mr. Aldermaston's giving proper additional
publicity to the whisper of Miss de Toddler's flight with the milkman.

There were not many people who liked Mr. Aldermaston, though
there were a great many who feared him; but Lord Dollamore was
among the former class. "He is a blagueur," Dollamore used to say;
"and a blagueur is a detestable beast; but necessary to society; and
Aldermaston is certainly clean. He knows how to behave himself, and
is in fact an Ananias of polite society. Besides, he amuses me, and
there are very few people in the world who amuse me."

So Lord Dollamore always spoke to Mr. Aldermaston at the club, and

encouraged him to tell his anecdotes; and when he found him at
Baden, he looked upon him as one of the resources of the place,-a
purveyor of news infinitely fresher, more piquant, and more amusing
than was to be found in the week-old Times or three-days-old
Galignani, which he found at Misses Marx's library.

So he again repeated, "And what's the latest news in this Inferno,

Mr. Aldermaston?"

"Well, there's very little news here, my lord, very little indeed; except
that young Lord Plaidington is gone--sent away this morning."

"Sent away?"

"Yes; his mother, Lady Macabaw, wouldn't stand it any longer. Last
night Lord Plaidington took too much again, and began throwing the
empty champagne-bottles out of the window of the Angleterre; so
Lady Macabaw sent him off this morning with his tutor, the Rev.
Sandford Merton, and they've gone to Strasburg, on the way to
Italy."

"Serve him right, the young cub. I went away early last night--any
heavy play late?"

"Yes; a Frenchman whom no one had ever seen before won a hatful
at roulette, and some Englishman whom no one seemed to know
backed him and stood in. They looked like breaking the bank at one
time, but they didn't."

"Was Tchernigow at the tables?"

"No; the Prince did not show up at all,--has not been there for the
last three nights."
"So much the worse for Benazet; but what does it mean?"

"Well, I've a notion about that that I won't broach to any one but
your Lordship. I think I've found the clue to that story."

"What story? what clue?"

"Prince Tchernigow's sudden cessation from play. You know what a

mania it was with him. It must have been something special to make
him give it up."

"And what is the something special?"

"A woman."

"Ah!" said Lord Dollamore, warming a once into interest;

"malheureux en jeu, heureux en amour,--the converse of the
ordinarily-received motto. Has Mademoiselle Féodor arrived from the
Gaieté? or who is the siren that charms our Prince from the tables?"

"Mademoiselle Féodor has not arrived, but some one else has. A
much more dangerous person than Mademoiselle Féodor, and with
much more lasting hopes in view."

Lord Dollamore looked keenly at his companion, and said, "I begin to
find the scent warming; but I make it a rule never to guess. Tell your
story, Mr. Aldermaston, please."

"Well, you know, Lord Dollamore, I'm staying at the Russie, and I've
made myself so agreeable to Malmedie, the landlord there, by little
bits of civility, that he generally comes up to my room in the morning
and lets me know all that is going on. He showed me a letter that he
had about a week ago, written in French, saying that a lady wanted
rooms reserved for herself and maid; that she would not dine at the
table-d'hôte, being an invalid, and coming only for the benefit of the
air and springs, but should require dinner and all her meals served in
her own rooms. The French of the letter was excellent, but the idea
of retirement looked essentially English. I never knew a
Frenchwoman, in however bad a state of health, who could resist
the attractions of society; so, though I said nothing to Malmedie, I
guessed at once the lady was English; and as there seemed a
mystery, I determined to penetrate it."

Lord Dollamore smiled, and whispered something to his stick;

something of which the French word "chiffonnier" and the English
word "garbage" were component parts; but Mr. Aldermaston did not
hear the sentence, and only marking the smile, proceeded:

"They were expected on Wednesday afternoon, and I took care to

be about. They came in the eilwagen from Carlsruhe,--a deuced
fine-looking woman, with her face hidden in a thick black veil, and a
very neat trim little French waiting-maid. The servant was French,
but the boxes were English,--I'd take my oath of that. There was a
substantial solidity about their make, a certainty about their locks
and hinges, such as never yet was seen on a French box, I'll stake
my existence."

"You have wonderful powers of observation, Mr. Aldermaston," said

Dollamore, still grinning.

"Your lordship flatters me. I have a pair of eyes, and I think I can
use them. I kept them pretty tightly fixed on the movements of the
new-comers. Dinner was sent up to their rooms, but before it went
up the lady's-maid went out. I was strolling about myself, with
nothing to do just at that time, so I strolled after her. She went into
the Angleterre, and in a few minutes came tripping out again. She
went back to the Russie, and so did I. I had nothing to do, and sat
down in the porch, behind one of those tubs with the orange-trees,
to smoke a cigar. While I was smoking it, who should come up but
Prince Tchernigow?"

"Prince Tchernigow!" cried Lord Dollamore. "Connu! I'm in full cry

now, Mr. Aldermaston. But continue your story."
"Prince Tchernigow," continued Mr. Aldermaston, "and no one else.
He asked for Madame Poitevin, in which name the rooms had been
taken, and he was shown upstairs. He came the next day twice,
twice yesterday; he was there this morning; and just now, as I came
away from the table-d'hôte, I met him on the steps going in."

"Mr. Aldermaston, you are impayable!" said Dollamore. "I must pay a
compliment to your perspicacity, even at the risk of forestalling the
conclusion of your narrative. But you have told it so admirably, that
no man with a grain of sense in his head could avoid seeing that
Madame Poitevin is Mrs. Hammond."

"Exactly,--I have not a doubt of it," said the little man; "and if so, I
think you and I, my lord, know some one whose state of mind must
be awful."

"Yes," said Lord Dollamore, rising from his chair; "I see what you
mean, and you are doubtless right. Poor Percy Hammond's relatives
must feel it acutely. Goodnight, Mr. Aldermaston;" and he bowed and
moved off.

"I'm not going to let that little cad indulge in any speculations about
the Mitfords," said he to his stick. "That woman's far too good to be
discussed by such vermin as that;" by which we may judge that Lord
Dollamore's opinion of Lady Mitford had altered as his acquaintance
with her had progressed.

The deductions which Mr. Aldermaston had made from this last
experiment in espionage were tolerably correct. Laura Hammond
was in Baden under the name of Madame Poitevin, and
accompanied by the never-failing Marcelline.

She had hurried away from London for two reasons. The first, and
by far the most important, was to perfect the conquest of
Tchernigow; to clinch home that iron band which for the last two
months she had been fitting round the Russian's neck; to bring him
to make the offer of his hand at once. The short time passed in
London since her husband's death had been spent in looking her
future boldly in the face, and calculating within herself how she
should mould it for the best. Lord Dollamore was right in one of his
conjectures about her: she had made up her mind that the course of
her life must henceforth be entirely altered. She knew well enough
that even the short time she had been away from London and its
world was sufficient to render her name almost forgotten; and she
determined that when it was next mentioned it should be in a very
different tone from that formerly adopted towards it. Respectability--
that state so often sneered at and ridiculed by her--she now held in
the highest veneration, and determined to attain to. She had her
work to do; to restore herself in the world's good opinion, and to
make, as soon as decency would permit, a good marriage. The last
position gained, the first would necessarily follow. All she had to do,
she thought, was to keep herself in seclusion and choose her
intended victim.

She thought of Sir Laurence Alsager at once. She had yet for him a
remnant of what she imagined was love, but what was really
thwarted passion. Her feelings were stronger for him than for any
other man; and he had large wealth, and a good old family title, and
the good opinion of the world. When, after his interview with her,
she saw the utter futility of her plans so far as he was concerned,
she was enraged, but by no means defeated. The cast must be
made in another direction, and at once. Prince Tchernigow was in
town; she knew it, for she had had more than one note from him
during her seclusion in the country, and she knew that Tchernigow
was hanging on in town on the chance of seeing her. This flashed
across her the moment Laurence had quitted her, and her heart gave
a great leap. That was the man! He was a prince; he was three
times as rich as Alsager, and was known in the best society of every
capital in Europe. Life with him as his wife would not be spent buried
two-thirds of the year in a great gaunt country-place, where interest
in the Sunday-schools and the old women and the clergyman's
charities were the excitements; life with him would be one round of
gaiety, in which she would not be a follower, but a leader. He had
been madly in love with her two years before; and from what she
knew of his nature, she believed the passion still remained there.
That could be easily ascertained. She would write him a note,
bidding him to come and see her.

Tchernigow came at once. He had not been with Laura ten minutes
before her sharp eyes had looked into his heart and read its secrets
so far as she was concerned. He was chafing under a latent passion,
a thwarted wish. When, just at the close of their companionship at
Baden two years ago, he had ventured to make open protestation of
his devotion to her, and she had turned on him with great dignity
and snubbed him mercilessly, he had bowed and left her, cool and
collected indeed in his manner, but inwardly raging like a volcano. He
had never met with similar treatment. With him it was a question of
throwing the handkerchief, to the delight of Nourmahal or whoever
might be the lucky one towards whom his highness tossed it. The
ladies of the corps dramatique of the different Parisian theatres were
wild with delight when they heard that Tchernigow had arrived in
Paris, and the will of mon Cosaque, as he was called by more than
one, was supreme and indisputable among them. This was quite a
new thing. Not merely to have his proffered love rejected, but to be
soundly rated for having dared to proffer it, was to him almost
inexplicable. It lashed him to fury. For the next season he kept away
from London, determined to avoid the siren who held him in her
toils, yet despised his suit. Then, hearing of her widowhood and her
absence from London, he came to England with a half-formed
determination in regard to her. He saw her, and almost
instantaneously the smouldering fires of his passion were revivified,
and blazed up more fiercely than ever.

He had more encouragement now, but even now not very much. He
was permitted to declare his devotion to her, to rave in his odd wild
way about her beauty, to kiss her hand on his arrival and departure--
nothing more. Trust Laura Hammond for knowing exactly how to
treat a man of Tchernigow's temperament. He came daily; he sat
feasting his eyes on her beauty, and listening--sometimes in wonder,
but always in admiration--to her conversation, which was now
sparkling with wit and fun, now brimming over with sentiment and
pathos. Day by day he became more and more hopelessly entangled
by her fascinations, but as yet he had breathed no word about
marriage; and to that end, and that alone, was Laura Hammond
leading him on. But when Parliament was dissolved, and town
rapidly thinning; when Laura's solicitor had written urgently to her,
stating that "the other side" was pressing for a final settlement of
affairs--which meant her abdicating her state and taking up her
lowered position on her lessened income--Tchernigow called upon
her, and while telling her that he was going to Baden, seemed to do
more than hint that her hopes would be fulfilled, if she would
consent to meet him there so soon as her business was
accomplished.

This was the principal motive which had induced her to start for the
pretty little Inferno on the border of the Black Forest. But the other
was scarcely less cogent. The fact was, that Laura was wearying
rapidly of the attentions of Sir Charles Mitford. Her caprice for him
was over. He had never had the power of amusing her; and since
she knew that Laurence Alsager had left England, she saw that she
could no longer wreak her vengeance on him by punishing Lady
Mitford through the faithlessness of Sir Charles. Mitford saw that she
was growing weary of him--marked it in a thousand different ways,
and raged against it. Occasionally his manner to her would change
from what she now called maudlin tenderness to savage ferocity; he
would threaten her vaguely, he would watch her narrowly. It
required all Laura's natural genius for intrigue, supplemented by
Madlle. Marcelline's adroitness, to prevent his knowing of
Tchernigow's visits. In his blind infatuation he was rapidly forgetting
the decencies of life, the convenances of society; he was getting
himself more and more talked about; what was worse, he was
getting her talked about again, just at the time when she wanted to
be forgotten by all men--save one. Mitford had followed her into the
country, and only quitted her on her expressed determination never
to speak to him again unless he returned to London at once, and
saved her from the gossip of the neighbourhood. She knew he
would insist on seeing her constantly when she returned to town.
Hence her flight with only one hour's stoppage in London--and under
a feigned name--to Baden.

"'I pray you come at once,'" said Dollamore, three days after his
conversation with Mr. Aldermaston, reading to his stick the contents
of a dainty little note which he had just received;--"'I pray you come
at once.--Yours sincerely, Laura Hammond.' Very much yours
sincerely, Laura Hammond, I should think. What the deuce does she
want with me? Is she going to drive us three abreast, like the horses
in the diligence? and does she think I should like to trot along
between Mitford and Tchernigow? Not she! She knows me too well
to think anything of that sort. But then what on earth does she want
with me? 'I pray you come at once.' Egad, I must go, I suppose, and
ask for Madame Poitevin, as she tells me."

He lounged up to the Hôtel de Russie, asked for Madame Poitevin,

and was shown into a room where Laura was seated with Marcelline
reading to her. Dollamore recollected Marcelline at once; he had an
eye for beauty in every class, and had taken not an unfavourable
notice of the trim little soubrette during his stay at Redmoor. He
wondered now what had caused this sudden elevation of her social
status, and did not ascribe it to any good source. But he had little
time to wonder about Marcelline, for she rose at once, and passing
him with a slight bow, left the room as Mrs. Hammond advanced
with outstretched hand. She looked splendidly handsome; her eyes
were bright, her cheeks flushed, her step elastic. Dollamore thought
he had scarcely ever seen her to such advantage.

"You are surprised at my having sent to you, Lord Dollamore?" said

she as soon as they were seated.

"No, indeed, Mrs. Hammond; I'm never surprised at anything. A man

who has turned forty and suffers himself to be surprised is an idiot."
"Turned forty! Well, when you reach that age you shall tell me
whether there is truth in that axiom." ("Flattering me!" said
Dollamore to his stick; "wants to borrow money.") "But at all events
you don't know why I asked you to come."

"I have not the remotest idea."

"How should you have? Three hours ago I myself had no anticipation
of the occurrence of circumstances which have induced me to ask
you to share a confidence."

"Hallo!" said Dollamore to his stick; "I share a confidence! She ought
to have sent for Aldermaston." But he said aloud, "If I can be of any
help to you--"

"You can be of the very greatest assistance. You may have heard
how I have been left by my husband; how Mr. Hammond's relatives,
by their cruel and secret machinations, so worked upon him in his
enfeebled state as to induce him to make a most shameful will, by
which I was robbed of all that ought to have been mine, and left
with a beggarly income!" She had not forgotten that will, and any
recurrence to it made her cheek flame in earnest.

Dollamore bowed. He ought to have expressed some pity or some

astonishment; but he had never during his life been guilty of any
conventionality.

"In this strait," she continued, "I have received succour from a
totally unexpected quarter. In the most generous and delicate
manner Prince Tchernigow has this day made me an offer of his
hand." (Dollamore said he was never surprised, but if the stick was
on the alert it must have heard him whistle.) "We are to be married
at once!"

"Very satisfactory indeed," said Dollamore. "Fancy being a princess,

with 'vassals and serfs by your side'!--Very delicious indeed."
"Oh, I'm so happy!" cried Laura, with that feigned ecstasy of joy
which she had so often indulged in; "the Prince is so charming!"

"Is he indeed?" said Dollamore. "Yes; some people require to be

known thoroughly before they're appreciated. But what will a friend
of ours say to this? I mean Sir Charles Mitford."

"Ah!" said Laura, who turned pale at the name; "that is exactly the
subject in which I require your assistance."

"Mine! How can I help you? Suppose he were to come here--"

"It is that I am dreading. I took every precaution to hide my

destination. I came here under a feigned name; I have lived in the
strictest retirement, having seen no one but the Prince since I have
been here; and yet I never hear a carriage dash up to the door of
the hotel but I rush to the window, and concealing myself behind
the curtains, look out in the full expectation of seeing him leap into
the portico. If he were to come now, under present circumstances,
what should I do?--good God, what should I do?"

"What should you do? Tell him to go back again. You are not his
wife, for him to bully and curse and order about. You are not bound
to give in to his cowardly whims, and need not endure his ruffianly
insults."

"You don't know him now; you don't know how frightful his temper
has become to any one who crosses him. No, no, no, we shall be
married at once, and leave this place; and should he come here
afterwards, I trust you to tell him nothing more than you can
possibly help; above all, to keep silence as to our intended route."

"That will be easily managed, by your not telling me which way you
intend going. I'll do what I can to help you, Mrs. Hammond; but I
may as well say, that the less I am brought into contact with Sir
Charles Mitford, the better I shall be pleased."