PERS

Laverick, sitting with Zoe at dinner, caught his companion looking
around the restaurant with an expression in her face which he did
not wholly understand.

"Something is the matter with you this evening, Zoe," he said
anxiously. "Tell me what it is. You don't like this place, perhaps?"

"Of course I do."

"It is your dinner, then, or me?" he persisted. "Come, out with it.
Haven't we promised to tell each other the truth always?"

The pink color came slowly into her cheeks. Her eyes, raised for a
moment to his, were almost reproachful.

"You know very well that it is not anything to do with you," she
whispered. "You are too kind to me all the time. Only," she went
on, a little hesitatingly, "don't you realize--can't you see how
differently most of the girls here are dressed? I don't mind so
much for myself--but you--you have so many friends. You keep on
seeing people whom you know. I am afraid they will think that I
ought not to be here."

He looked at her in surprise, mingled, perhaps, with compunction.
For the first time he appreciated the actual shabbiness of her
clothes. Everything about her was so neat--pathetically neat, as
it seemed to him in one illuminating moment of realization. The
white linen collar, notwithstanding its frayed edges, was spotlessly
clean. The black bow was carefully tied to conceal its worn parts.
Her gloves had been stitched a good many times. Her gown, although
it was tidy, was old-fashioned and had distinctly seen its best days.
He suddenly recognized the effort--the almost despairing effort--which
her toilette had cost her.

"I don't think that men notice these things," he said simply. "To
me you look just as you should look--and I wouldn't change places
with any other man in the room for a great deal."

Her eyes were soft--perilously soft--as she looked at him with
uplifted eyebrows and a faint smile struggling at the corners of her
lips. A wave of tenderness crept into his heart. What a brave
little child she was!

"You will quite spoil me if you make such nice speeches," she
murmured.

"Anyhow," he went on, speaking with decision, "so long as you feel
like that, you are going to have a new gown--or two--and a new
hat, and you are going to have them at once. They are going to be
bought with your brother's money, mind. Shall I come shopping with
you?"

She shook her head.

"Mind, it is partly for your sake that I give in," she said. "It
wou