p your friend, my sorceress of song," but he added under
his breath, "Look to it, when the lover comes, for you may still lose
_him_." Then he took up his violin, and the night became a splendid
harmony, despite the discord that raged in his soul.

CHAPTER X

A DISCUSSION OF PROGRESSIVE WOMEN

The group that had foregathered about Mrs. Ramsey's tea-table that
Thursday afternoon had scattered and gone its several ways. The last of
them was bidding her adieu as her husband entered and joined her
brothers, who were lingering for a farewell word with her, each occupied
in characteristic fashion, John gazing into the fire that smouldered on
the grate, for it was a raw and chilly afternoon, and Frank endeavoring
to coax a last cup of tea from the silver tea-ball and the still
steaming kettle.

"If you really want another cup, Frank, let me have the tea-ball
refilled," Mrs. Ramsey said, and then laying her hand on her elder
brother's shoulder, "A new Lincoln penny for your thoughts, Jack. You
look as if they might be romantic, but I suppose you are really off on
the quest of the blooming bacillus or the meandering microbe, or hanging
over--what is it you call your garden beds of disease--a culture?"

He looked up and patted her hand. "It is too bad not to be able to be a
hero to one's own sister, but the truth is, I wasn't thinking at all,
just wool-gathering. By the way, Frank, are you going to motor down to
that meeting of Miss Holland's to-night?"

"Wool-gathering, he calls it!" said the younger man, letting his lump of
sugar clatter on his saucer. "I'd say it was all cry and no wool; at
least you are pulling none over my eyes. Am I going to motor down to
hear the protests of the proletariat to-night? No, dear brother, I am
not. When I go out to mingle with the down-trodden and oppressed I take
the 'L'; a surface car would be even more appropriate, but they take
forever, and I compromise on the 'L,' but you never did have any sense
of dramatic fitness."

"Might I ask why this sudden interest in the militant laboring ladies?"
said Ramsey, drawing up his chair before the fire, and lighting a
cigarette. "Are you going to obtrude your somewhat massive personality
upon the scene?"

"Yes, that's what I'd like to know," added Frank.

The doctor laughed rather diffidently. "Why not?" he said. "Why
shouldn't I go, if I wish to?"

Frank flung out his hands with a gesture of mock despair. "Now, wouldn't
that come