yllis, you will not let me go even if I tell you that I want
to go. Don't believe me, Phyllis; I don't want to go--I don't want to
be lost, and if I leave you I am lost. You will keep me, dear, will you
not?"

"Until the end of the world," said Phyllis. "Come, dearest Ella, tell me
what is the matter--why you have come to me in that lovely costume. You
look as if you were dressed for a bridal."

"A bridal--a bridal? What do you mean by that?" said Ella, with curious
eagerness--a suggestion of suspicion was in her tone. She had loosed her
hold upon the girl's arms.

Phyllis laughed. She put a hand round Ella's waist and led her to a
sofa, saying:

"Let us sit down and talk it all over. That is the lace you told me you
picked up at Munich. What a design--lilies!"

"The Virgin's flower--the Virgin's flower! I never thought of that,"
laughed Ella. "It is for you--not me, this lace. I shall tear it off
and--"

"You shall do nothing of the kind," cried Phyllis. "I have heaps
of lace--more than I shall ever wear. What a lovely idea that is of
yours,--I'm sure it is yours,--sewing the diamonds around the cup of the
lilies, like dewdrops. I always did like diamonds on lace. Some people
would have us believe that diamonds should only be worn with blue
velvet. How commonplace! Where have you been to-night?"

"Where have I been? I have been at home. Where should a good woman be in
the absence of her husband, but at home--his home and her home?"

Ella laughed loud and long with her head thrown back on the cushion of
the sofa, and the diamonds in her hair giving back flash for flash to
the electric candles above her head. "Yes; I was at home--I dined at
home, and, God knows why, I conceived a sudden desire to go to the
opera,--Melba is the _Juliet_,--and forgetting that you were engaged
to the Earlscourts--you told me last week that you were going, but I
stupidly forgot, I drove across here to ask you to be my companion. Oh,
yes, I have been here since--since nine, mind that! nine--nine--ask the
servants. When I heard that you were dining out I thought that I was
lost--one cannot drive about the streets all night, can one? Ah! I
thought that God was against me now, as he ever has been; and as for my
guardian angel--ah! our guardian angels are worse than the servants of
nowadays who have no sense of responsibility. Thompson, your butler, is
worth a whole heavenful of angels, for it was he who asked me if I would
come in and