're older, dear. You've changed. I like your face
better now than I ever did."

I wrinkled my nose at her. "Is that saying much?" I grimaced.

"Heaps!" She attempted to smile back at me, but her lower lip quivered.
"Yours has always been my favorite face, you know, Ambo. Phil's is
wiser--somehow, and stronger, too; and Jimmy's is sunnier, healthier,
and--yes, handsomer, dear! Nobody could call you handsome, could they?
But you're not ugly, either. Sister was adorably ugly. It was a daily
miracle to see the lamp in her suddenly glow through and glorify
everything. I used to wait for it. It's the only thing that has ever
made me feel--humble; I never feel that way with you. I just feel
satisfied, content."

"Like putting on an old pair of slippers," I ventured.

"That's it," sighed Susan happily, and closed her eyes.

"That's it!" echoed my familiar demon, "but no one but Susan would have
admitted it."

As usual, I found it wiser to cut him dead.

"Well, dear," I said to Susan, "there's one good thing: you'll be able
to use the old pair of slippers any time you need them now. I'm to be
held in Paris, I find, for a three-months' job."

She opened her eyes again; disapprovingly, I felt.

"You shouldn't have done that, Ambo! You're needed at Evian; I know you
are. It's bad enough to be out of things myself, but I won't drag you
out of them! How could you imagine that would please me?"

"I hoped it would, a little," I replied, "but it hasn't any of it been
my doing--Chatworth's wife's expecting a baby in a few weeks, and he
wants to run home to welcome it; I'm to take on his executive work till
he gets back. God knows he needs a rest!"

"As if you didn't, too!" protested Susan, inconsistently enough. Her
eyes fell shut again; her hands slipped from mine. "Ambo," she asked
presently, in a thread of voice that I had to lean down to her to hear,
"have they told you I can never have a baby now?... Wasn't it lucky if
that had to happen to some woman--it happened to me?"

No, they had not told me; and for the moment I could not answer her.

"Jimmy's wife is going to have a baby soon," added Susan.

"Jimmy's--_what_!" I shrieked. Yes, shrieked--for, to my horror, I heard
my voice crack and soar, strident, incredulous.

Susan was staring at me, wide-eyed, her face aquiver with excitement;
two deep spots of color flaming on her thin cheeks.

"Didn't you _know_?"

The white door opened as she spoke, and Susan's Norm