length.

"You're a man," she said, "and a big man. I suppose I ought--to love
you. To have the power of loving you in me. And oh, there have been
moments when I thought I could." She stopped as though appalled by the
lengths to which she had gone. "You see, I'm trying to be fair now.
I'm telling you everything."

And then, with the thought which succeeded, it was as though she felt
the physical tingle of bay leaves in her nostrils, "or nearly
everything."

Through the open French windows came the cheery voice of Kate
Waddington.

"Tea is served, ladies and gentlemen!"

"All right--be along presently!" called Bertram. And then to Eleanor:

"You must tell me--you can't keep me hanging by the toes until I see
you again."

"The rest means--since I am being perfectly fair to you--that I can't
tell." Now something like strong emotion touched her voice--"Don't
think I am coquetting with you--don't believe that it is anything but
my effort to be fair." She turned on this, and stepped through the
open window.

Bertram struggling to compose his face, Eleanor wearing her old air of
sweet inscrutability, they faced the quick, perceiving glance of Kate
Waddington who sat pouring tea from the crack between two shell
bowls.

Eleanor settled herself on the teak-wood stool.

"You _must_ come out on the balcony before we go," she cried. "I never
saw the city lights so wonderful."

"Well," said Kate, "it all depends on the company!"

CHAPTER X

Kate's plump and inert mother, who always regarded this daughter of
hers somewhat as a cuckoo in the nest, was in a complaining mood this
morning. She sat in her dressing-gown embroidering peonies on a
lambrequin and aired her grievances. Kate, writing notes at the
old-fashioned black walnut writing desk, looked up at the climaxes of
her mother's address, bit her pen and frowned over her shoulder. For
the greater part of the time, however, Mrs. Waddington spoke to empty
air.

"I never did see such a daughter," said Mrs. Waddington, jabbing with
her scissors at a loose end of pink silk. "As if it isn't enough,
gallivanting around the way you do, fairly living in other people's
houses, never bringing any company home, but you can't even be
decently civil when you _are_ at home. We might just as well be a
hotel for all the respect you pay us. What are you doing when you're
away, I'd like to know? It's all well enough, the stories you tell--"
Kate, resting between notes, s