ing back----"

"To Hampton?"

"To Hampton."

"When?" she said, sceptically.

"Very soon!"

"Delightfully indefinite!" she laughed.

"In fact, within a week."

She laughed, again!

"To be accurate, I expect him not later than the day-after-to-morrow."

"I shall believe you, when I see him!" incredulously.

"He is, I think, coming solely on your account."

"But you're not quite sure?--oh! modest man!"

"Naturally, he hasn't confided in me."

"So you're confiding in me--how clever!"

"I could tell some things----"

"Which are fables."

"----but I won't--they might turn your head----"

"Which way--to the right or left?"

"----and make you too confident and too cruel. He saw you but
twice----"

"Once!" she corrected.

"Once, on the street; again, when we called in the evening--but he gave
you a name, the instant he saw you----"

"How kind of him!"

"He called you: 'The Symphony in Blue.'"

"Was I in blue?" she asked.

"You were--and looking particularly fit."

"Was that the first time you had noticed it?" she questioned blandly.

"Do you think so?" he returned.

"I am asking you, sir."

"Do I impress you as being blind?"

"No, you most assuredly do not!" she laughed.

He looked at her with daring eyes.

"Yes!" she said, "I know you're intrepid--but you _won't_!"

"Why?--why won't I?"

"Because, it would be false to your friend. You have given me to him."

"I have given you to him!" he exclaimed, with denying intonation.

"Yes!--as between you two, you have renounced, in his favor."

"I protest!"

"At least, I so view it," with a teasingly fascinating smile.

"I protest!" he repeated.

"I heard you."

"I protest!" he reiterated.

"Don't you think that you protest over-much?" she inquired sweetly.

"If we were two children, I'd say: 'You think you're smart, don't
you?'"

"And I'd retort: 'You got left, didn't you?'"

Then they both laughed.

"Seriously, however--do you really expect Mr. Macloud?" she asked.

"I surely do--probably within two days; and I'm not chaffing when I say
that you're the inducement. So, be good to him--he's got more than
enough for two, I can assure you."

"Mercenary!" she laughed.

"No--just careful!" he answered.

"And what number am I--the twenty-first, or thereabout?"

"What matters it, if you're _the_ one, at present?"

She raised her shoulders in the slightest shrug.

"I'd sooner be the present one than all the has-beens," he