Mrs. Bobby regained her carriage, and consulting her engagement book, she ordered her coachman to drive her to the house of one of her friends, whose "day at home" it was. It was a sudden resolution. She had gone about very little that winter, since she had no longer the incentive of chaperoning Elizabeth, and had not paid a visit for weeks, on the plea of mourning for an uncle. But now she set her teeth and said to herself that she must mingle with the world to find out, if possible, what the world was saying.

Was it fancy, or did she distinguish, as she stood in the hall of Mrs. Van Alden's house leaving cards, amidst the hum of voices in the drawing-room, words that bore upon her own fevered anxiety? "Shocking affair," and "so she is really involved in it"—surely she heard those sentences. And then the conversation ceased abruptly as the butler drew aside the portiÈre and she stood for a moment on the threshold. Her eyes were bright, her head erect; she glanced around taking mental stock as it were of the company. Five or six women were seated about a blazing wood fire, with an air unusual at functions of this kind of having come to stay and of forming—or this again might have been her fancy—a sort of council of justice. There was Mrs. Lansdowne, to whose ball Elizabeth had not been invited; and there was Sibyl Hartington, and one or two others who knew Mrs. Bobby and did not, as it happened, love her very much. "Enemies," she thought, drawing her breath sharply, "and discussing Elizabeth and me! It's the same thing—I'm sure I feel as if it were I under suspicion." Eleanor Van Antwerp had certainly never known such a feeling before, but her bearing had never been more instinct with the nonchalant confidence of a woman who seems absolutely unconscious of her position, for the reason that it has never been questioned.

"I seem to have interrupted the conversation," she observed, lightly, after she had been rather nervously greeted and kissed by her hostess, and had taken her place in the circle. "Some one was telling a very interesting story—I caught fragments of it as I came in." She glanced her eye round the group. "It was you, Kitty, I think," she said. "Won't you—please—begin the story over again and tell it for my benefit?"

"Kitty," thus appealed to, colored and bit her lip. "Oh, the story isn't really worth repeating," she said, hastily. She had no wish to offend Mrs. Van Antwerp, and was heartily wishing that she had not spoken so loud. Sibyl Hartington helped her out by observing, with her placid smile:

"It's a story about a friend of yours, my dear Eleanor, so Kitty is afraid to tell it."

"About a friend of mine?" said Mrs. Bobby, and she opened her eyes very wide. "Then there's all the more reason," she said, decidedly, "why I should hear it."

Her glance challenged the group, but no one spoke and at last the hostess interposed. "My dear Eleanor, I'm sorry you should have heard anything about it. We were only talking about poor Elizabeth Van Vorst, and regretting that there is all this unfortunate gossip about her. For my part, I don't believe there is a word of truth in what they say, but it is certainly—uncomfortable."

"It makes it hard to know what to do," said Mrs. Lansdowne, a woman with a deep bass voice and an air of being not so much indifferent to, as unconscious of other people's feelings. "I couldn't for instance ask Miss Van Vorst to my ball while there are these queer rumors about her. I was sorry to leave out any friend of yours, Mrs. Van Antwerp; but if a young woman gets herself talked about, no matter how or why, I can't encourage her—it's against my principles. Let the girl behave herself, I say, and keep out of the papers. I'm sure that's simple enough."

"It's not always so simple," said Mrs. Bobby, and though the indignant color had rushed into her cheeks, her tone was seraphic, "not so simple for every one as it is for your daughters, Mrs. Lansdowne." A subdued smile as she spoke went the round of the circle. Fortunately Mrs. Lansdowne was not quick in her perceptions.

"No, it's true," she admitted, "my daughters have had unusual advantages. I can't expect every one to come up to the same standard. But one has to draw the line somewhere, and when a girl has done such queer things as Miss Van Vorst, there seems nothing for it but to drop her."

"But what—what has poor Elizabeth done?" asked Mrs. Bobby, with eyes of innocent wonder, and again there followed an awkward silence.

"Well, you know, Eleanor, they tell very queer stories," the hostess said at last, deprecatingly. "I never pay any attention to gossip, but these things are sometimes forced upon one. Haven't you seen that thing in Scandal?"

"I don't," said Mrs. Bobby, unmoved, "read 'Scandal,' Mary."

"And Chit Chat," chimed in some one else. "There was a long paragraph in Chit Chat. It seems that she was mixed up in some way in that dreadful poisoning case. They say that she was actually married to that young Halleck."

"At the same time that she was engaged to Julian Gerard," said Mrs. Hartington, with her calm smile. "It's no wonder that he, poor man, when he found it out, got out of the affair as best he could."

Mrs. Bobby looked steadily at the speaker. "As a friend of Mr. Gerard's, Sibyl," she said, "I can state on his authority that the engagement was broken by Miss Van Vorst."

Sibyl Hartington's calm, faintly amused smile again rippled across her face. "I never doubted, my dear Eleanor," she said, "that Mr. Gerard is a gentleman."

The entrance of another visitor at that moment was not altogether unwelcome to Mrs. Bobby, who felt that she was being worsted; but the new-comer immediately continued the same subject.

"I've just been hearing the most extraordinary news," she exclaimed, sitting on the edge of her chair, and too much excited to notice Mrs. Bobby's presence, "I heard it at luncheon. They say that Elizabeth Van Vorst"—But here the speaker suddenly caught sight of Mrs. Bobby, and stopped short.

"Well, what do they say?" said Mrs. Bobby, with rather a bitter smile. "Don't keep us in suspense, Miss Dare, and above all, don't mind my feelings. I would rather know the worst of this."

"Well, I don't believe there is any truth in it. They say that she is really seriously implicated in that dreadful poisoning case; that the police have letters she wrote to Halleck, and all sorts of unpleasant things. But of course it's impossible—a girl like that, whom we all know!"

"Do we?" said Mrs. Hartington, softly. "Do you think that we, any of us, know much about her? You didn't, Eleanor, did you?"—turning to Mrs. Bobby—"You just took her up in that charming, impulsive way of yours—didn't you?—because people in the Neighborhood didn't have much to do with her, and you felt sorry for her?"

Mrs. Bobby made a scornful little gesture. "You flatter me, Sibyl," she said. "I'm afraid I'm not so charitable as all that. I 'took up' Elizabeth Van Vorst, as you say, because I liked her, and for no other reason. It was for my own pleasure entirely that I asked her to stay with me, and I have never regretted it."

Mrs. Hartington gave a barely perceptible shrug of the shoulders. "I congratulate you," she said. "It was a rash action, some people thought at the time. A girl whom you knew so slightly, whose mother was such an impossible person—or at least, so they say. I don't of course," she went on, in her soft, drawling tones, "know much about it myself, but it does make all this gossip seem less extraordinary—doesn't it?"

"Why, yes, of course, that accounts for it," said Mrs. Lansdowne, looking relieved. "That sort of thing runs in families. A girl who has a queer mother is sure to be queer herself and get herself talked about."

"I never thought her very good style," some one who had not yet spoken now found courage to observe. "Her hair is so conspicuous. I never could understand why men seemed to admire her."

Mrs. Hartington raised her eye-brows. "Ah, the men!" she said, with serene scorn. "She is exactly the sort of girl who would appeal to men."

Mrs. Bobby felt that she had stayed as long as the limit of human endurance would permit. She rose to her feet, her cheeks were flushed, her eyes brilliant, her voice rang out with crystal clearness. "It's hardly necessary for me to tell you," she said, "that Elizabeth Van Vorst is my most intimate friend. I love her very dearly and always shall. What her mother may have been is no affair of mine. But as for the men liking her"—she turned suddenly to Mrs. Hartington—"they do like her, Sibyl, and I think they show good taste. But if you mean the inference you seem to draw from that"—she paused and drew her breath quickly—"why, it's not very flattering, I think, to either men or women."

Mrs. Hartington gave a short little laugh. "My dear, I'm not drawing inferences one way or another. I merely stated a fact—complimentary, one might think, to your protegÉe. But you take things so seriously!"—She drew herself up with an air of some annoyance.

Mrs. Bobby's hands were tightly locked together inside her muff, she faced the group appealingly, her dark eyes wandering from one to the other. "Certainly, I take this thing seriously," she said, and there was a thrill of earnestness in her voice which moved more than one of her hearers. "It's no light matter for me to hear my friend spoken of—like this. I had Elizabeth Van Vorst with me all last winter, I feel as if I knew her like my own sister. I believe in her implicitly, no matter what any one may say. And if—if some of you"—instinctively her eyes fastened upon one or two whom she felt she was carrying with her—"if you would try to think the best, give her the benefit of the doubt, show that women can stand by one another—sometimes"—Her voice faltered and she broke off suddenly; there were tears glistening in her eyes as she held out her hand to her hostess. "Forgive me, Mary," she said. "I don't want to make a scene. But I can't help feeling strongly, and in this case I want every one to know exactly how I feel." And with that she left the room quickly before any one could speak, yet conscious as she went of a subtle wave of sympathy, which seemed to have made itself felt since her entrance.

"But it's useless—useless," she said sadly to her husband when she got home. "You might as well try to stop the course of a torrent as fight against the world's disapproval, when it is once roused against any poor, defenceless girl. And it isn't as if she were a great personage, or even as if she were still engaged to Julian! They've nothing to gain by standing by her. Yet there were one or two, I think, even of those women this afternoon, who felt with me. And at least"—she consoled herself a little—"at least they shall see that she has friends!"

"She'll need them, poor girl. The—the inquest—I've just heard—is coming off next week." He took up a paper knife and played with it, while he stole a furtive glance at his wife. "I think you had better—prepare Elizabeth," he said.

"Prepare her?" she repeated anxiously, as he paused.

"For some confoundedly unpleasant questions! Yes. Have you the strength to tell her?" His eyes questioned her anxiously. She was white to the lips, but she met them without flinching.

"One can always find strength."

"It's confoundedly hard, I know." Bobby began to pace up and down helplessly. "You don't know how I hate to have you mixed up in all this, Eleanor," he said. "I'd give anything to have you out of it. Wouldn't it be better for you to go abroad for awhile?"

"And desert Elizabeth? My dear Bobby, you wouldn't have me do that?"

"Well, you can't help her, you know," he urged.

"I can show that I believe in her. And, thank Heaven! social position does count for something. It may help me to fight Elizabeth's battles."

"It doesn't count for much, unfortunately, before the law."

"Not theoretically, no," said his wife, sceptically. "But practically—it counts with every one and everywhere. By the way," she added, struck with a sudden idea, "what sort of man is the District Attorney? I might ask him to dinner." And she looked prepared to send the invitation on the spot.

"My dear Eleanor, I'm afraid it's too late for that now. The thing to do now, since matters have gone so far, is to prove Elizabeth's innocence, and for that, the first step is to prepare her, so that she won't be taken unawares. Her aunts too—they must be told, I suppose. Poor things, I believe it will kill them!"

"People don't die so easily. It would be more merciful, I sometimes think, if they did." She sat and thought for a moment. "I think I had better go there at once," she said, at last, nervously. "I couldn't sleep to-night with this hanging over my head."

And so, for the second time that day, she drove to the Van Vorsts' apartment, feeling that her unexpected appearance in itself must prepare them for some calamity. And indeed the telling proved easier than she feared. She saw Elizabeth alone, and sat holding the girl's hand, trying by many tender circumlocutions to break the force of the blow. But Elizabeth understood almost immediately.

"They think I sent the poison—is that it?" she said, going at once to the point which her friend was approaching so carefully. "Well, that isn't so strange. Sometimes I feel," she added, wearily, and putting her hand to her head, "as if I had done it myself. I think I—I might have done it."

"Elizabeth, Elizabeth, what do you mean?"

"Because I wished it, you know," Elizabeth went on to explain quite calmly. "I was married to him, and I wished that he might die, so that no one would ever know it, I didn't tell any one but Julian—I wouldn't have told him if I could have helped it. That was the reason he gave me up—because I told him that I had been secretly married all the time. He was angry because I hadn't told him before."

"But," interrupted Mrs. Bobby, with intense anxiety, "you did tell him, at last?"

"Yes, of course I told him," said Elizabeth, in surprise. "I told him New Year's Eve. Why else should he have given me up?"

"Then," cried Mrs. Bobby, rising to her feet in her excitement, "that seems to me an unanswerable argument. If you had—had expected Paul Halleck's death, you certainly wouldn't have told Julian Gerard of your marriage. That's clear as daylight. Oh, Elizabeth, how fortunate that you told him!"

"Fortunate?" said Elizabeth, listlessly. "I don't see that it is very fortunate, since he has given me up and will never forgive me."

"But it may save you." Elizabeth looked at her blankly. "Oh, my dear child," cried Mrs. Bobby, "don't you understand that they suspect you of—of the murder?"

"You don't mean that they would put me in prison?"

Mrs. Bobby only answered by her silence. Elizabeth sat staring at her for a moment, then the color rushed into her white face, her eyes flashed. "How would they dare do that," she cried, "when I am innocent?"

"Of course you are," said Mrs. Bobby. "No one but a fool would think otherwise. And we will prove it, never fear. But you mustn't talk any more of this morbid nonsense about being guilty of his death and all that. I know what you mean well enough, but the general public doesn't understand such psychological subtleties. And besides, it's not true. The guilty person had no thought of doing you a service—be sure of that. Paul Halleck would have died, my dear, if you had never known him. And now keep up a brave heart, Elizabeth. Your friends will stand by you, and when all this is over—happily over, you will look back upon it as a bad dream—nothing more."

Mrs. Bobby had almost talked herself into feeling the confidence she expressed; but Elizabeth listened languidly, with drooping head. All color had faded again from her face; it looked haggard, worn; her hands plucked nervously at some fringe on her gown. When she wiped her eyes at the last words, the smile she conjured up was piteous.

"It's a dream," she murmured, "that is lasting—a terribly long time."