Toward the end of March Strelsa, with the Wycherlys, returned to New York, dead tired. She had been flattered, run after, courted from Palm Beach to Havana; the perpetual social activity, the unbroken fever of change and excitement had already made firmer the soft lineaments of the girl's features, had slightly altered the expression of the mouth.

By daylight the fatigues of pleasure were faintly visible—that unmistakable imprint which may perhaps leave the eyes clear and calm, but which edges the hardened contour of the cheek under them with deeper violet shadow.

Not that hers was as yet the battered beauty of exhaustion; she had merely lived every minute to the full all winter long, and had overtaxed her capacity; and the fire had consumed something of her freshness.

Not yet inured, not yet crystallised to that experienced hardness which withstands the fierce flame of living too fast in a world where every minute is demanded and where sleep becomes a forgotten art, the girl was completely tired out, and while she herself did not realise it, her features showed it.

But nervous exhaustion alone could not account for the subtle change in her expression. Eyes and lips were still sweet, even in repose, but there was now a jaded charm about them—something unspoiled had disappeared from them—something of that fearlessness which vanishes after too close and too constant contact with the world of men.

Evidently her mind was quite as weary as her body, though even to herself she had not admitted fatigue; and a tired mind no longer defends itself. Hers had not; and the defence had been, day by day, imperceptibly weakening. So that things to which once she had been able at will to close her mind, and, mentally deaf, let pass unheard, she had heard, and had even thought about. And the effort to defend her ears and mind became less vigorous, less instinctive—partly through sheer weariness.

The wisdom of woman and of man, and of what is called the world, the girl was now learning—unconsciously in the beginning and then with a kind of shamed indifference—but the creation of an artificial interest in anything is a subtle matter; and the ceaseless repetition of things unworthy at last awake that ignoble curiosity always latent in man. Because intelligence was born with it; and unwearied intelligence alone completely suppresses it.

At first she had kept her head fairly level in the whirlwind of adulation. To glimpses of laxity she closed her eyes. Sir Charles was always refreshing to her; but she could see little more of him than of other men—less than she saw of Langly Sprowl, however that happened—and it probably happened through the cleverness of Langly Sprowl.

Again and again she found herself with him separated from the others—sometimes alone with him on deck—and never quite understood how it came about so constantly.

As for Sprowl he made love to her from the first; and he was a trim, carefully groomed and volubly animated young man, full of information, and with a restless, ceaseless range of intelligence which at first dazzled with its false brilliancy.

But it was only a kind of flash-light intelligence. It seemed to miss, occasionally; some cog, some screw somewhere was either absent or badly adjusted or over-strained.

At first Strelsa found the young fellow fascinating. He had been everywhere and had seen everything; his mind was kaleidoscopic; his thought shifted, flashed, jerked, leaped like erratic lightning from one subject to another—from Japanese aeroplanes to a scheme for filling in the East River; from a plan to reconcile church and state in France to an idea for indefinitely prolonging human life. He had written several books about all kinds of things. Nobody read them.

The first time he spoke to her of love was on a magnificent star-set night off Martinique; and she coolly reminded him of the gossip connecting him with a pretty woman in Reno. She could not have done it a month ago.

He denied it so pleasantly, so frankly, that, astonished, she could scarcely choose but believe him.

After that he made ardent, headlong love to her at every opportunity, with a flighty recklessness which began by amusing her. At first, also, she found wholesome laughter a good defence; but there was an under-current of intelligent, relentless vigour in his attack which presently sobered her. And she vaguely realised that he was a man who knew what he wanted. A talk with Molly Wycherly sobered her still more; and she avoided him as politely as she could. But, being her host, it was impossible to keep clear of him. Besides there was about him a certain unwholesome fascination, even for her. No matter how bad a man's record may be, few women doubt their ability to make it a better one.

"You little goose," said Molly Wycherly, "everybody knows the kind of man he is. Could anything be more brazen than his attentions to you while Mary Ledwith is in Reno?"

"He says that her being there has nothing to do with him."

"Then he lies," said Molly, shrugging her shoulders.

"He doesn't speak as though he were trying to deceive anybody, Molly. He is perfectly frank to me. I can't believe that scandal. Besides he is quite open and manly about his unsavoury reputation; makes no excuses; simply says that there's good in every man, and that there is always one woman in the world who can bring it out——"

"Oh, mushy! What an out-of-date whine! He's bad all through I tell you——"

"No man is!" insisted Strelsa.

"What?"

"No man is. The great masters of fiction always ascribe at least one virtue to their most infamous creations——"

"Oh, Strelsa, you talk like a pan of fudge! I tell you that Langly Sprowl is no good at all. I hope you won't have to marry him to find out."

"I don't intend to.... How inconsistent you are, Molly. You—and everybody else—believe him to be the most magnificent match in——"

"If position and wealth is all you care for, yes. I didn't suppose you'd come to that."

Strelsa said candidly: "I care for both—I don't know how much."

"As much as that?"

"No; not enough to marry him. And if he is what you say, it's hopeless of course.... I don't think he is. Be decent, Molly; everybody is very horrid about him, and—and that is always a matter of sympathetic interest to a generous woman. When the whole world condemns a man it makes him interesting!"

"That's a piffling and emotional thing to say! He may be attractive in an uncanny way, because he's agreeable to look at, amusing, and very dangerous—a perfectly cold-blooded, and I think, slightly unbalanced social marauder. And that's the fact about Langly Sprowl. And I wish we were on land, the Yulan and her owner in—well, in the Erie Basin, perhaps."

Whether or not Strelsa believed these things, there still remained in her that curious sense of fascination in Sprowl's presence, partly arising, no doubt, from an instinctive sympathy for a young man so universally damned; partly, because she thought that perhaps he really was damned. Therefore, deep in her heart she felt that he must be dangerous; and there is, in that one belief, every element of unwholesome fascination. And a mind fatigued is no longer wholesome.

Then, too, there was always Sir Charles Mallison to turn to for a refreshing moral bath. Safety of soul lay in his vicinity; she felt confidence in the world wherever he traversed it. With him she relaxed and rested; there was repose for her in his silences; strength for her when he spoke; and a serene comradeship which no hint of sentiment had ever vexed.

Perhaps only a few people realised how thoroughly a single winter was equipping Strelsa for the part she seemed destined to play in that narrow world with which she was already identified; and few realised how fast she was learning. Laxity of precept, easy morals, looseness of thought, idle and good-natured acquiescence in social conditions where all standards seemed alike, all ideals merely a matter of personal taste—this was the atmosphere into which she had stepped from two years of Western solitude after a nightmare of violence, cruelty, and depravity unutterable. And naturally it seemed heavenly to her; and each revelation inconsistent with her own fastidious instincts left her less and less surprised, less and less uneasy. And after a while she began to assimilate all that she saw and heard.

A few unworldly instincts remained in her—gratitude for and quick response to any kindness offered from anybody; an inclination to make friends with stray wanderers into her circle, and to cultivate the socially useless.

Taking four o'clock tea alone with Mrs. Sprowl the afternoon of her return to town—an honour vouchsafed to few—Strelsa was relating, at that masterful woman's request, her various exotic experiences. Mrs. Sprowl had commanded her attendance early. There were reasons. And now partly vexed, partly in unwilling admiration, the old lady sat smiling and all the while thinking to herself impatiently; "Baby! Fool! Little ninny! Imbecile!" while she listened, fat bejewelled hands folded, small green eyes shining in the expanse of powdered and painted fat.

After a while she could endure it no longer, and she said with a wheeze of good-natured disdain:

"It's like a school-girl's diary—all those rhapsodies over volcanoes, palm trees, and the colour of the Spanish Main. Never mind geography, child; tell me about the men!"

"Men?" repeated Strelsa, laughingly—"why there were shoals and shoals of them, of every description!"

"I mean the one man?" insisted Mrs. Sprowl encouragingly.

"Which, please?"

"Nonsense! There was one, I suppose."

"Oh, I don't think so.... Your nephew, Langly, was exceedingly amiable——"

"He's a plain beast," said his aunt, bluntly. "I didn't mean him."

"He was very civil to me," insisted Strelsa, colouring.

"Probably he didn't have a chance to be otherwise. He's a rotter, child. Ask anybody. I know perfectly well what he's been up to. I'm sorry you went on the Yulan. He had no business to ask you—or any other nice girl—or anybody at all until that Reno scandal is officially made respectable. If it were not for his money—" She stopped a moment, adding cynically—"and if it were not for mine—certain people wouldn't be tolerated anywhere, I suppose.... How did you like Sir Charles?"

"Oh, he is charming!" she said warmly.

"You like him?"

"I almost adore him."

"Why not adore him entirely?"

Strelsa laughed frankly: "He hasn't asked me to, for one reason. Besides——"

"No doubt he'll do it."

The girl shook her head, still smiling:

"You don't understand at all. There isn't the slightest sentiment between us. He's only thoroughly nice and agreeable, and he and I are most companionable. I hope nobody will be silly enough to hint anything of that sort to him. It would embarrass him dreadfully."

Mrs. Sprowl's smile was blandly tolerant:

"The man's in love with you. Didn't you know it?"

"But you are mistaken, dear Mrs. Sprowl. If it were true I would know it, I think."

"Nonsense! He told me so."

"Oh," said Strelsa in amazed consternation. She added: "If it is so I'd rather not speak of it, please."

Mrs. Sprowl eyed her with shifty but keen intelligence. "Little idiot," she thought; but her smile remained bland and calmly patronising.

For a second or two longer she studied the girl cautiously, trying to make up her mind whether there was really any character in Strelsa's soft beauty—anything firmer than material fastidiousness; anything more real than a natural and dainty reticence. Mrs. Sprowl could ride rough-shod over such details. But she was too wise to ride if there was any chance of a check from higher sources.

"If you married him it would be very gratifying to me," she said pleasantly. "Come; let's discuss the matter like sensible women. Shall we?"

Many people would not have disregarded such a wish. Strelsa flushed and lifted her purple-gray eyes to meet the little green ones scanning her slyly.

"I am sorry," she said, "but I couldn't discuss such a thing, you see. Don't you see I can't, dear Mrs. Sprowl?"

"Pooh! Rubbish! Anybody can discuss anything," rejoined the old lady with impersonal and boisterous informality. "I'm fond of you. Everybody knows it. I'm fond of Sir Charles. He's a fine figure of a man. You match him in everything, except wealth. It's an ideal marriage——"

"Please don't!—I simply cannot——"

"Ideal," repeated Mrs. Sprowl loudly—"an ideal marriage——"

"But when there is no love——"

"Plenty! Loads of it! He's mad about you—crazy!—--"

"I—meant—on my part——"

"Good God!" shouted the old lady, beating the air with pudgy hands—"isn't it luck enough to have love on one side? What does the present generation want! I tell you it's ideal, perfect. He's a good man as men go, and a devilish handsome——"

"I know—but——"

"And he's got money!" shouted the old lady—"plenty of it I tell you! And he has the entrÉe everywhere on the Continent—in England—everywhere!—which Dankmere has not!—if you're considering that little whelp!"

Stunned, shrinking from the dreadful asthmatic noises in Mrs. Sprowl's voice, Strelsa sat dumb, wincing under the blows of sound, not knowing how to escape.

"I'm fond of you!" shrieked the old lady—"I can be of use to you and I want to be. That's why I asked you to tea! I want to make you happy—and Sir Charles, too! What the devil do you suppose there is in it for me except to oblige hi—you both?"

"Th-thank you, but——"

"I'll bet a shilling that Molly Wycherly let you go about with any little spindle-shanked pill who came hanging around!—And I told her what were my wishes——"

"Please—oh, please, Mrs. Sprowl——"

"Yes, I did! It's a good match! I want you to consider it!—I insist that——"

"Mrs. Sprowl!" exclaimed Strelsa, pink with confusion and resentment, "I am obliged to you for the interest you display, but it is a matter——"

"What!"

"I am really—grateful—but——"

"Answer me, child. Has that cursed nephew of mine made any impression on you? Answer me!"

"Not the kind you evidently mean!" said Strelsa, helplessly.

"Is there anybody else?"

The outrageous question silenced the girl for a moment. Angry, she still tried to be gentle; tried to remember the age, and the excellent intentions of this excited old lady; and she answered in a low voice:

"I care for no man in particular, unless it be Sir Charles—and——"

"And who?"

"Mr. Quarren, I think," she said.

Mrs. Sprowl's jowl grew purple with fury:

"You—has that boy had the impudence—damn him——"

Strelsa sprang to her feet.

"I really cannot remain—" she said with decision, but the old lady only bawled:

"Sit down! Sit down!"

"I will not!"

"Sit down!" she roared in a passion. "What the devil——"

Strelsa, a little pale, started to pass her—then halted, astounded: for the old lady had burst into a passion of choking gasps. Whether the terrible sounds she made were due to impotent rage or asthma, Strelsa, confused, shocked, embarrassed, but still angry, had no notion; and while Mrs. Sprowl coughed fatly, she stood still, catching muffled fragments of reproaches directed at people who flouted friendship; who had no consideration for age, and no gratitude, no tenderness, no pity.

"I—I am grateful," faltered Strelsa, "only I cannot——"

"I wanted to be a mother to you! I've tried to be," wheezed the old lady in a fresh paroxysm; and beat the air.

For one swift instant the girl remembered what her real mother had been to her; and her heart hardened.

"I care only for your friendship, Mrs. Sprowl; I do not wish you to do anything for me; can we not be friends on that basis?"

Mrs. Sprowl swabbed her inflamed eyes and peered around the corner of the handkerchief.

"Come here, my dear," she said.

Strelsa went, slowly; and Mrs. Sprowl enveloped her like a fleshy squid, panting.

"I only wanted to be good to you, Strelsa. I'm just an old fool I suppose——"

"Oh, please don't——"

"That's all I am, child, just a sentimental old fool. The poor man's adoration of you touched my heart—and you do like him a little, don't you?"

"Very much.... Thank you for—for wishing happiness to me. I really don't mean to be ungrateful; I have a horror of ingratitude. It's only that—the idea never occurred to me; and I am incapable of doing such a thing for material reasons, unless—I also really cared for a man——"

"Of course, child. Maybe you will care for him some day. I won't interfere any more.... Only—don't lose your heart to any of these young jackals fawning around your skirts. Every set is full of 'em. They're nothing but the capering chorus in this comic opera.... And—don't be angry—but I am an older and wiser woman than you, and I am fond of you, and it's my duty to tell you that any of the lesser breed—take young Quarren for example—are of no real account, even in the society which they amuse."

"I would scarcely class Mr. Quarren with the sort you mention——"

"Why not? He's of no importance."

"Because he is kind, considerate, and unusually intelligent and interesting; and he is very capable of succeeding in whatever he undertakes," said Strelsa, slowly.

"Ricky is a nice boy; but what does he undertake?" asked Mrs. Sprowl with good-natured contempt. "He undertakes the duties, obligations, and details of a useful man in the greater household, which make him acceptable to us; and I'm bound to say that he does 'em very well. But outside of that he's a nobody. And I'll tell you just what he'll turn into; shall I? Society's third chief bottlewasher in succession. We had one, who evolved us. He's dead. We have another. He's still talking. When he ultimately evaporates into infinity Ricky will be his natural successor. Do you want that kind of a husband?"

"Did you suppose——"

"Don't get angry, Strelsa? I didn't suppose anything. Ricky, like every other man, dangles his good-looking, good-humoured self in your vicinity. You're inclined to notice him. All I mean is that he isn't worth your pains.... Now you won't be offended by a plain-spoken old woman who wishes only your happiness, will you, my child?"

"No," said Strelsa, wearily, beginning to feel the fatigue of the scene.

She took her leave a few moments afterward, very unhappy because two of the pleasantest incidents in her life had been badly, if not hopelessly, marred. But Langly Sprowl was not one of them.

That hatchet-faced and immaculate gentleman, divining possibly that Strelsa might be with his aunt, arrived shortly after her departure; learned of it from a servant, and was turning on his heel without even asking for Mrs. Sprowl, when the thought occurred to him that possibly she might know Strelsa's destination.

When a servant announced him he found his aunt quite herself, grim, ready for trouble, her small green eyes fairly snapping.

They indulged in no formalities, being alone together, and caring nothing for servants' opinions. Their greeting was perfunctory; their inquiries civil. Then there ensued a short silence.

"Which way did Mrs. Leeds go?" he asked, busily twisting his long moustache.

"None of your business," rejoined his aunt.

He looked up in slight surprise, recognised a condition of things which, on second thought, surprised him still more. Because his aunt had never before noticed his affairs—had not even commented on the Ledwith matter to him. He had always felt that she disliked him too thoroughly to care.

"I don't think I understood you," he said, watching her out of shifting eyes which protruded a trifle.

"I think you will understand me before I've done with you," returned his aunt, grimly. "It's a perfectly plain matter; you've the rest of the female community to chase if you choose. Go and chase 'em for all I care—hunt from here to Reno if you like!—but I have other plans for Strelsa Leeds. Do you understand? I've put my private mark on her. There's no room for yours."

Langly's gaze which had not met hers—and never met anybody's for more than a fraction of a second—shifted. He continued his attentions to his moustache; his eyes roved; he looked at but did not see a hundred things in a second.

"You don't know where she's gone?" he inquired with characteristic pertinacity and an indifference to what she had said, absolutely stony.

"Do you mean trouble for that girl?"

"I do not."

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing."

"Do you want to marry her?"

"I said that I was considering nothing in particular. We are friends."

"Keep away from her! Do you understand?"

"I really don't know whether I do or not. I suppose you mean Sir Charles."

Mrs. Sprowl turned red:

"Suppose what you like, you cold-blooded cad! But by God!—if you annoy that child I'll empty the family wash all over the sidewalk! And let the public pick it over!"

He rested his pale, protuberant eyes on her for a brief second:

"Will any of your finery figure in it? Any relics or rags once belonging to the late parent of Sir Charles?"

Her features were livid; her lips twisted, tortured under the flood of injuries which choked her. Not a word came. Exhausted for a moment she sat there grasping the gilded arms of her chair, livid as the dead save for the hell blazing in her tiny green eyes.

"I fancy that settles the laundry question," he said, while his restless glance ceaselessly swept the splendid room and his lean, sunburnt hand steadily caressed his moustache. Then, as though he had forgotten something, he rose and walked out. A footman invested him with hat and overcoat. A moment later the great doors clicked.

In the silence of the huge house there was not a sound except the whispers of servants; and these ceased presently.

All alone, amid the lighted magnificence of the vast room sat the old woman hunched in her chair, bloodless, motionless as a mass of dead flesh. Even the spark in her eyes was gone, the lids closed, the gross lower lip pendulous. Later two maids, being summoned, accompanied her to her boudoir, and were dismissed. Her social secretary, a pretty girl, came and left with instructions to cancel invitations for the evening.

A maid arrived with a choice of headache remedies; then, with the aid of another, disrobed her mistress and got her into bed.

Their offices accomplished, they were ordered to withdraw but to leave one light burning. It glimmered over an old-fashioned photograph on the wall—the portrait of a British officer taken in the days when whiskers, "pill-box," and frogged frock-tunic were cultivated in Her British Majesty's Service.

From where she lay she looked at him; and Sir Weyward Mallison stared back at her through his monocle.

Strelsa at home, unpinning her hat before the mirror, received word over the telephone that Mrs. Sprowl, being indisposed, regretfully recalled the invitations for the evening.

The girl's first sensation was relief, then self-reproach, quite forgetting that if Mrs. Sprowl's violent emotions had made that redoubtable old woman ill, they had also thoroughly fatigued the victim of her ill-temper and made her very miserable.

She wrote a perfunctory note of regret and civil inquiry and dispatched it, then surrendered herself to the ministrations of her maid.

The luxury of dining alone for the first time in months, appealed to her. She decided that she was not to be at home to anybody.

Langly Sprowl called about six, and was sent away. Strelsa, curled up on a divan, could hear the staccato racket that his powerful racing-car made in the street outside. The informality of her recent host aboard the Yulan did not entirely please her. She listened to his departure with quiet satisfaction.

Although it was not her day, several people came and went. Flowers from various smitten youths arrived; orchids from Sprowl; nothing from Quarren. Then for nearly two hours she slept where she lay and awakened laughing aloud at something Quarren had been saying in her dream. But what it was she could not recollect.

At eight her maid came and hooked her into a comfortable and beloved second-year gown; dinner was announced; she descended the stairway in solitary state, still smiling to herself at Quarren's forgotten remark, and passed by the library just as the telephone rang there.

It may have been a flash of clairvoyance—afterward she wondered exactly what it was that made her say to her maid very confidently:

"That is Mr. Quarren. I'll speak to him."

It was Mr. Quarren. The amusing coincidence of her dream and her clairvoyance still lingering in her mind, she went leisurely to the telephone and said:

"I don't understand how I knew it was you. And I'm not sure why I came to the 'phone, because I'm not at home to anybody. But what was it you said to me just now?"

"When?"

"A few minutes ago while I was asleep?"

"About eight o'clock?"

She laughed: "It happened to be a few minutes before eight. How did you know that? I believe you did speak to me in my dream. Did you?"

"I did."

"Really?"

"I said something aloud to you about eight o'clock."

"How odd! Did you know I was asleep? But you couldn't——"

"No, of course not. I was merely thinking of you."

"You were—you happened to be thinking of me? And you said something aloud about me?"

"About you—and to you."

"How delightfully interesting! What was it, please?"

"Oh, I was only talking nonsense."

"Won't it bear repetition?"

"I'm afraid not."

"Mr. Quarren! How maddening! I'm dying with curiosity. I dreamed that you said something very amusing to me and I awoke, laughing; but now I simply cannot recollect what it was you said."

"I'll tell you some day."

"Soon? Would you tell me this evening?"

"How can I?"

"That's true. I'm not at home to anybody. So you can't drop in, can you?"

"You are not logical; I could drop in because I'm not anybody——"

"What!"

"I'm not anybody in particular——"

"You know if you begin to talk that way, after all these days, I'll ring off in a rage. You are the only man in the world to whom I'm at home even over the telephone, and if that doesn't settle your status with me, what does?... Are you well, Mr. Quarren?"

"Thank you, perfectly. I called you up to ask you about yourself."

"I'm tired, somehow."

"Oh, we are all that. Nothing more serious threatens you than impending slumber?"

"I said I was tired, not sleepy. I'm wide awake but horribly lazy—and inclined to slump. Where are you; at the Legation?"

"At the Founders' Club—foundered."

"What are you doing there?"

"Absolutely nothing. Reading the Evening Post."

"You are dining out I suppose?"

"No."

She reflected until he spoke again, asking if she was still there.

"Oh, yes; I'm trying to think whether I want you to come around and share a solitary dinner with me. Do I want you?"

"Just a little—don't you?"

"Do you want to come?"

"Yes."

"Very much?"

"I can't tell you how much—over the telephone."

"That sounds both humble and dangerous. Which do you mean to be?"

"Humble—and very, very grateful, dear lady. May I come?"

"I—don't know. Dinner was announced a quarter of an hour ago."

"It won't take me three minutes——"

"If it takes you more you'll ring my door-bell in vain, young man."

"I'll start now! Good——"

"Wait! I haven't decided. Really I'm simply stupid with the accumulated fatigues of two months' frivolity. Do you mind my being stupid?"

"You know I don't——"

"Shame on you! That was not the answer. Think out the right one on your way over. À bien tÔt!"

She had been in the drawing-room only a few moments, looking at the huge white orchids that Langly Sprowl had sent and which her butler was arranging, when Quarren was announced; and she partly turned from the orchids, extending her hand behind her in a greeting more confident and intimate than she had ever before given him.

"Look at these strange, pansy-shaped Brazilian flowers," she said. "Kindly observe that they are actually growing out of that ball of moss and fibre."

She had retained his hand for a fraction of a second longer than conventional acquaintance required, giving it a frank and friendly pressure. Now, loosing it, she found her own fingers retained, and drew them away with a little laugh of self-consciousness.

"Sentiment before dinner implies that you'll have no room for it after dinner. Here is your cocktail."

"Do you remember our first toast?" he asked, smiling.

"No."

"The toast to friendship?"

"Yes; I remember it."

She touched her lips to her glass, not looking at him. He watched her. After a moment she raised her eyes, met his gaze, returned it with one quite as audacious:

"I am drinking that same toast again—after many days," she said.

"With all that it entails?"

She nodded.

"Its chances, hazards, consequences?"

She laughed, then, looking at him, deliberately sipped from her glass, the defiant smile in her eyes still daring him and Chance and Destiny together.

When he took her out she was saying: "I really can't account for my mood to-night. I believe that seeing you again is reviving me. I was beastly stupid."

"My soporific society ought to calm, not exhilarate you."

"It never did, particularly. What a long time it is since we have seen each other. I am glad you came."

Seated, she asked the butler to remove the flowers which interrupted her view of Quarren.

"You haven't said anything about my personal appearance," she observed. "Am I very much battered by my merry bouts with pleasure?"

"Not much."

"You wretch! Do you mean to say that I am marked at all?"

"You look rather tired, Mrs. Leeds."

"I know I do. By daylight it's particularly visible.... But—do you mind?"

Her charming head was bent over her grapefruit: she lifted her gray eyes under level brows, looking across the table at him.

"I mind anything that concerns you," he said.

"I mean—are you disappointed because I'm growing old and haggard?"

"I think you are even more beautiful than you were."

She laughed gaily and continued her dinner. "I had to drag that out of you, poor boy. But you see I'm uneasy; because imprudence is stamping the horrid imprint of maturity on me very rapidly; and I'm beginning to keep a more jealous eye on my suitors. You were one. Do you deny your guilt?"

"I do not."

"Then I shall never release you. I intend to let no guilty man escape. Am I very much changed, Mr. Quarren?" she said a trifle wistfully.

He did not answer immediately. After a few moments she glanced at him again and met his gaze.

"Well?" she prompted him, laughing; "are you not neglecting your manners as a declared suitor?"

"You have changed."

"What a perfect pill you are!" she exclaimed, vexed—"you're casting yourself for the rÔle of the honest friend—and I simply hate it! Young sir, do you not understand that I've breakfasted, lunched and dined too long on flattery to endure anything more wholesome? If you can't lie to me like a gentleman and a suitor your usefulness in my entourage is ended."

He said: "Do you want me to talk shop with you? I get rather tired of my trade, sometimes. It's my trade to lie, you know."

She looked up, quickly, but he was smiling.

They remained rather silent after that. Coffee was served at table; she lighted a cigarette for him and, later, one for herself, strolling off into the drawing-room with it between her fingers, one hand resting lightly on her hip.

She seemed to have an inclination to wander about or linger before the marble fireplace and blow delicate rings of smoke at her own reflection in the mirror.

He stood a little distance behind her, watching her, and she nodded affably to him in the glass:

"I'm quite changed; you are right. I'm not as nice as I was when I first knew you.... I'm not as contented; I'm restless—I wasn't then.... Amusement is becoming a necessity to me; and I'm not particular about the kind—as long as it does amuse me. Tell me something exciting."

"A cradle song is what you require."

"How impudent of you. I've a mind to punish you by retiring to that same cradle. I'm dreadfully cross, too. Do you realise that?"

"I realise how tired you are."

"And—I'll never again be rested," she said thoughtfully, looking at her mirrored self. "I seem to understand that, now, for the first time.... Something in me will always remain a little tired. I wonder what. Do you know?"

"Conscience?" he suggested, laughing.

"Do you think so? I thought it was my heart."

"Have you acquired one?"

She laughed, too, then glanced at him askance in the glass, and turned around toward him, still smiling.

"I believe I didn't have any heart when I first knew you. Did I?"

"I believe not," he said lightly. "Has one germinated?"

"I really don't know. What do you think?"

He took her cigarette from her and tossed it, with his own, into the fire. She seated herself on a sofa and bent toward the blaze, her dimpled elbows denting her silken knees, her chin balanced between forefinger and thumb.

Presently she said, not looking at him: "Somehow, I've changed. I'm not the woman you knew. I'm beginning to realise it. It seems absurd: it was only a few weeks ago. But the world has whirled very swiftly. Each day was a little lifetime in itself; a week a century condensed; Time became only a concentrated essence, one drop of which contained eons of experience.... I wonder whether my silly head was turned a little.... People said too much to me: there were too many of them—and they came too near.... And do you know—looking back at it now as I sit here talking to you—I—it seems absurd—but I believe that I was really a trifle lonely at times."

She interlaced her fingers and rested her chin on the back of them.

"I thought of you on various occasions," she added.

He was leaning against the mantel, one foot on the fender.

Her eyes rested on that foot, then lifted slowly until they remained fixed on his face which was shadowed by his hand as though to shield his eyes from the bracket light.

For a time she sat motionless, considering him, interested in his silence and abstraction—in the set of his shoulders, and the unconscious grace of him. Light, touching his short blond hair, made it glossy like a boy's where his hand had disarranged it above the forehead. Certainly it was very pleasant to see him again—agreeable to be with him—not exactly restful, perhaps, but distinctly agreeable—for even in the frequent silences that had crept in between them there was no invitation to repose of mind. On the contrary, she was perfectly conscious of a reserve force now awaking—of a growing sense of freshness within her; of physical renewal, of unsuspected latent vigour.

"Are you attempting to go to sleep, Mr. Quarren?" she inquired at last.

He dropped his hand, smiling: she made an instinctive move—scarcely an invitation, scarcely even perceptible. But he came over and seated himself on the arm of the lounge beside her.

"Your letters," he said, "did a lot for me."

"I wrote very few.... Did they really interest you?"

"A lot."

"How?"

"They helped that lame old gaffer, Time, to limp along toward the back door of Eternity."

"How do you mean?"

"Otherwise he would never have stirred a step—until to-night."

"That is very gallant of you, Mr. Quarren—but a little sentimental—isn't it?"

"Do you think so?"

"I don't know. I'm a poor judge of real sentiment—being unaccustomed to it."

"How many men made you declarations?"

"Oh; is that real sentiment? I thought it was merely love."

He looked at her. "Don't," he said. "You mustn't harden. Don't become like the rest."

She said, amused, or pretending to be: "You are clever; I have grown hard. To-day I can survey, unmoved, many, many things which I could not even look at yesterday. But it makes life more interesting. Don't you think so?"

"Do you, Mrs. Leeds?"

"I think so.... A woman might as well know the worst truths about life—and about men."

"Not about men."

"Do you prefer her to remain a dupe?"

"Is anybody happy unless life dupes them?"

"By 'life' you mean 'men.' You have the seraglio point of view. You probably prefer your women screened and veiled."

"We are all born veiled. God knows why we ever tear the film."

"Mr. Quarren—are you becoming misanthropic?" she exclaimed, laughing. But under his marred eyes of a boy she saw shadows, and the pale induration already stamped on the flesh over the cheek-bones.

"What have you been doing with yourself all these weeks?" she asked, curiously.

"Working at my trade."

"You seem thinner."

"Fewer crumbs have fallen from the banquet, perhaps. I keep Lent when I must."

"You are beginning to speak in a way that you know I dislike—aren't you?" she asked, turning around in her seat to face him.

He laughed.

"You make me very angry," she said; "I like you—I'm quite happy with you—and suddenly you try to tell me that my friendship is lavished on an unworthy man; that my taste is low, and that you're a kind of a social jackal—an upper servant——

"I feed on what the pack leaves—and I wash their fragile plates for them," he said lightly.

"What else?" she asked, furious.

"I take out the unfledged for a social airing; I exercise the mature; I smooth the plumage of the aged; I apply first aid to the socially injured; lick the hands that feed me, as in duty bound; tell my brother jackals which hands to lick and which to snap at; curl up and go to sleep in sunny boudoirs without being put out into the backyard; and give first-class vaudeville performances at a moment's notice, acting as manager, principals, chorus, prompter, and carpenter."

He laughed so gaily into her unsmiling eyes that suddenly she lost control of herself and her fingers closed tight.

"What are you saying!" she said, fiercely. "Are you telling me that this is the kind of a man I care enough for to write to—to think about—think about a great deal—care enough about to dine with in my own house when I denied myself to everybody else! Is that all you are after all? And am I finding my level by liking you?"

He said, slowly: "I could have been anything—I could be yet—if you——"

"If you are not anything for your own sake you will never be for anybody's!" she retorted.... "I refuse to believe that you are what you say, anyway. It hurts—it hurts——"

"It only hurts me, Mrs. Leeds——"

"It hurts me! I do like you. I was glad to see you—you don't know how glad. Your letters to me were—were interesting. You have always been interesting, from the very first—more so than many men—more than most men. And now you admit to me what kind of a man you really are. If I believe it, what am I to think of myself? Can you tell me?"

Flushed, exasperated by she knew not what, and more and more in earnest every moment, she leaned forward looking at him, her right hand tightening on the arm of the sofa, the other clenched over her twisted handkerchief.

"I could stand anything!—my friendship for you could stand almost anything except what you pretend you are—and what other malicious tongues will say if you continue to repeat it!—And it has been said already about you! Do you know that? People do say that of you. People even say so to me—tell me you are worthless—warn me against—against——"

"What?"

"Caring—taking you seriously! And it's because you deliberately exhibit disrespect for yourself! A man—any man is what he chooses to be, and people always believe him what he pretends to be. Is there any harm in pretending to dignity and worth when—when you can be the peer of any man? What's the use of inviting contempt? This very day a woman spoke of you with contempt. I denied what she said.... I'd rather they'd say anything else about you—that you had vices—a vigorous, wilful, unmanageable man's vices!—than to say that of you!"

"What?"

"That you amount to nothing."

"Do you care what they say, Mrs. Leeds?"

"Of course! It strikes at my own self-respect!"

"Do you care—otherwise?"

"I care—as a friend, naturally——"

"Otherwise still?"

"No!"

"Could you ever care?"

"No," she said, nervously.

She sat breathing faster and more irregularly, watching him. He looked up and smiled at her, rested so, a moment, then rose to take his leave.

She stretched out one arm toward the electric bell, but her fingers seemed to miss it, and remained resting against the silk-hung wall.

"Are you going?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Must you?"

"I think I'd better."

"Very well."

He waited, but she did not touch the bell button. She seemed to be waiting for him to go; so he offered his hand, pleasantly, and turned away toward the hall. And, rising leisurely, she descended the stairs with him in silence.

"Good-night," he said again.

"Good-night. I am sorry you are going."

"Did you wish me to remain a little longer?"

"I—don't know what I wish...."

Her cheeks were deeply flushed; the hand he took into his again seemed burning.

"It's fearfully hot in here," she said. "Please muffle up warmly because it's bitter weather out doors"—and she lifted the other hand as though unconsciously and passed her finger tips over his fur collar.

"Do you feel feverish?"

"A little. Do you notice how warm my hand is?"

"You haven't caught malaria in the tropics, have you?"

"No, you funny man. I'm never ill. But it's odd how burning hot I seem to be——"

She looked down at her fingers which still lay loosely across his.

They were silent for a while. And, little by little it seemed to her as though within her a curious stillness was growing, responsive to the quiet around her—a serenity stealing over her, invading her mind like a delicate mist—a dreamy mental lethargy, soothing, obscuring sense and thought.

Vaguely she was aware of their contact. He neither spoke nor stirred; and her palm burned softly, meltingly against his.

At last he lifted her hand and laid his lips to it in silence. Small head lowered, she dreamily endured his touch—a slight caress over her forehead—the very ghost of contact; suffered his cheek against hers, closer, never stirring.

Thought drifted, almost dormant, lulled by infinite and rhythmical currents which seemed to set her body swaying, gently; and, listless, non-resistant, conscious of the charm of it, she gradually yielded to the sorcery.

Then, like a shaft of sunlight slanting through a dream and tearing its fabric into tatters, his kiss on her lips awoke her.

She strove to turn her mouth from his—twisted away from him, straining, tearing her body from his arms; and leaned back against the stair-rail, gray eyes expressionless as though dazed. He would have spoken, but she shook her head and closed both ears with her hands; nor would she even look at him, now.

Sight and hearing sealed against him; pale, expressionless, she stood there awaiting his departure. And presently he opened the iron and glass door; a flurry of icy air swept her; she heard the metallic snap of the spring lock, and opened her heavy eyes.

Deadly tired she turned and ascended the stairs to her bedroom and locked the door against her maid.

Thought dragged, then halted with her steps as she dropped onto the seat before the dresser and took her throbbing head in her hands. Cheeks and lips grew hotter; she was aware of strange senses dawning; of strange nerves signalling; stranger responses—of a subtle fragrance in her breath so strange that she became conscious of it.

She straightened up staring at her flushed reflection in the glass while through and through her shot new pulses, and every breath grew tremulously sweet to the verge of pain as she recoiled dismayed from the unknown.

Unknown still!—for she crouched there shrinking from the revelation—from the restless wonder of the awakening, wilfully deaf, blind, ignorant, defying her other self with pallid flashes of self-contempt.

Then fear came—fear of him, fear of herself, defiance of him, and defiance of this other self, glimpsed only as yet, and yet already dreaded with every instinct. But it was a losing battle. Truth is very patient. And at last she looked Truth in the eyes.

So, after all, she was what she had understood others were or must one day become. Unawakened, pure in her inherent contempt for the lesser passion; incredulous that it could ever touch her; out of nothing had sprung the lower menace, full armed, threatening her—out of a moment's lassitude, a touch of a man's hand, and his lips on hers! And now all her life was already behind her—childhood, girlhood, wifehood—all, all behind her now; and she, a stranger even to herself, alone on an unknown road; an unknown world before her.

With every instinct inherent and self-inculcated, instincts of modesty, of reticence, of self-control, of pride, she quivered under this fierce humiliation born of self-knowledge—knowledge scornfully admitted and defied with every breath—but no longer denied.

She was as others were—fashioned of that same and common clay, capable of the lesser emotions, shamefully and incredibly conscious of them—so keenly, so incomprehensibly, that, at one unthinkable instant, they had obscured and were actually threatening to obliterate the things of the mind.

Was this the evolution that her winter's idleness and gaiety and the fatigues of pleasure had been so subtly preparing for her? Was that strange moment, at the door, the moment that man's enemy had been awaiting, to find her unprepared?

Wretched, humiliated, she bowed her head above the flowers and silver on her dresser—the fairest among the Philistines who had so long unconsciously thanked God that she was not like other women in the homes of Gath and in the sinful streets of Ascalon.