onally, as they edged their way by degrees towards the
house.

"Yes; I seem to have an unfortunate capacity for missing you
nowadays. At Bordighera, for instance. I have certainly had no luck
at all lately. I haven't even had an opportunity of telling you how
charming I find your house."

"Ah!" said Eve vaguely, her eyes wandering over the people who were
grouped upon the gravel walk and under the veranda outside the
windows of the supper-room, "we really seem to see nothing of you
now. Oh, let me introduce you to Mrs. Gibson--Mrs. Everett P.
Gibson. She's American; you'll find her very amusing."

Rainham followed her obediently, thinking, with a quickly repressed
passion of regret, of the child who would have confided to him her
latest impressions of sorrow, of joy; finding something, which
hardly emanated from himself, which made it seem difficult for him
to gather up the threads of the old, charming intimacy with this new
Eve--this woman, with her pretty, dignified bearing, and
self-possessed, almost cold attitude. The introduction was duly
effected, and for the next half-hour Rainham devoted himself
heroically to the mental and physical entertainment (he was not
obliged to do much talking) of the American lady, who hailed from
the Far West, and lectured him volubly, with an exorbitant accent
and a monotony of delivery, which began to tell on his nerves to an
alarming degree, on her impressions of Europe, and especially
England; the immense superiority of gas as a cooking and heating
agent; the phenomenal attainments of her children; and the
antiquities of Minneapolis.

After supper he found himself listening to the band in the garden
with a sentimental young lady, who made him fully conversant with
her adoration of moonlit nights, waltzing, the latest tenor, and the
scenery of Switzerland.

It was already growing late, and people had begun to leave, when it
struck him that, through no active fault of his own, other than a
certain complaisant indolence, he had as yet exchanged only the
briefest of greetings with Lady Garnett, while of Miss Masters only
a glimpse had been vouchsafed to him, at the further end of the
crowded supper-room. He wandered into the studio, where a little,
intimate party had assembled around an easel, and he was fortunate
enough in a few minutes to find himself invited to take possession
of a vacant seat precisely by Mary's side.

"Oh, you wicked person!" said Mary reproachfully. "Why