too.'

Leonora tried to fix her thoughts on the grateful figure of mild,
nervous, passionate Ethel, the child of her deepest affection.

She turned sharply. Arthur Twemlow was standing in the shadow of the
side-aisle near the door. She knew he was there before her eyes saw him.
He was evidently rather at a loss, unnoticed, and irresolute. He caught
sight of her and bowed. She said to herself that she wished to be alone
in her embarrassment, that she could not bear to talk to any one;
nevertheless, she raised her finger, and beckoned to him, while striving
hard to refrain from doing so. He approached at once. 'He is not in
America,' she reflected in sudden agitation, 'He is here, actually here.
In an instant we shall speak.'

'I quite understood you had gone back to New York,' she said, looking at
him, as he stood in front of her, with the upward feminine appealing
gesture that men love.

'What!' he exclaimed. 'Without saying good-bye? No! And how are you all?
It seems just about a year since I saw you last.'

'All well, thanks,' she said, smiling. 'Won't you sit here? It's John's
seat, but he isn't coming.'

'Then you are alone?' He seemed to apologise for the rest of his sex.

She told him that Uncle Meshach was with her, and would return directly.
When he asked how the opera was going, and she learnt that, being
detained at Knype, he had not seen the first act, she was relieved. He
would make the discovery concerning Millicent gradually, and by her
side; it was better so, she thought--less disconcerting. In a slight
pause of their talk she was startled to feel her heart beating like a
hammer against her corsage. Her eyes had brightened. She conversed
rapidly, pleased to be talking, pleased at his sympathetic
responsiveness, ignoring the audience, and also forgetting the uneasy
preoccupations of her recent solitude. The men returned from the Tiger
and elsewhere, all except Uncle Meshach. The lights were lowered. The
conductor's stick curtly demanded silence and attention. She sank back
in her seat.

'A peremptory conductor!' remarked Twemlow in a whisper.

'Yes,' she laughed. And this simple exchange of thought, effected, as it
were, surreptitiously in the gloom and contrary to the rules, gave her a
distinct sensation of joy.

Then began, in Bursley Town Hall, a scene similar to the scenes which
have rendered famous the historic stages of European capitals. The verve
and personal charm of a young _debutante