desk tremulous; Mamise to her typewriter. She
hammered out a devil's tattoo on it, and he devoured estimates and
commercial correspondence, while an aromatic haze enveloped them both
as truly as if they had been faun and nymph in a bosky glade.

Miss Gabus played Mrs. Grundy all morning and at the noon hour made a
noble effort to rescue Mamise from any opportunity to cast an evil
spell over poor Mr. Davidge. Women have a wonderful pity for men that
other women cultivate! Yet all that Miss Gabus said to Miss Webling
was:

"Goin' to lunch now, Mi' Swebling?"

And all that Miss Webling said was:

"Not just yet--thank you."

Both were almost swooning with the tremendous significance of the
moment.

Miss Webling felt that she was defying all the powers of espionage and
convention when she made so brave as to linger while Miss Gabus left
the room in short twitches, with the painful reluctance of one who
pulls off an adhesive plaster by degrees. When at last she was really
off, Miss Webling went to Davidge's door, feeling as wicked as the
maid in Ophelia's song, though she said no more than:

"Well, did you have a successful journey?"

Davidge whirled in his chair.

"Bully! Sit down, won't you?"

He thought that no goddess had ever done so divine a thing so
ambrosially as she when she smiled and shook her incredibly exquisite
head. He rose to his feet in awe of her. His restless hands, afraid to
lay hold of their quarry, automatically extracted his watch from his
pocket and held it beneath his eyes. He stared at it without
recognizing the hour, and stammered:

"Will you lunch with me?"

"No, thank you!"

This jolted an "Oh!" out of him. Then he came back with:

"When am I going to get a chance to talk to you?"

"You know my address."

"Yes, but--" He thought of that horrible evening when he had marched
through the double row of staring cottages. But he was determined.
"Going to be home this evening?"

"By some strange accident--yes."

"By some strange accident, I might drop round."

"Do."

They laughed idiotically, and she turned and glided out.

She went to the mess-hall and moved about, selecting her dishes.
Pretending not to see that Miss Gabus was pretending not to see her,
she took her collation to another table and ate with the relish of a
sense of secret guilt--the guilt of a young woman secretly betrothed.

Davidge kept away from the office most of the afternoon because Mamise
was so int