e signally failed to hit it off together?
Mrs. Luna only asked because she was really quite puzzled. "Don't you
know that some minds, when they see a mystery, can't rest till they
clear it up?"

"You can't be more puzzled than I am," said Ransom. "Apparently the
explanation is to be found in a sort of reversal of the formula you were
so good, just now, as to apply to me. You like my opinions, but you
entertain a different sentiment for my character. I deplore Miss
Tarrant's opinions, but her character--well, her character pleases me."

Mrs. Luna stared, as if she were waiting, the explanation surely not
being complete. "But as much as that?" she inquired.

"As much as what?" said Ransom, smiling. Then he added, "Your sister has
beaten me."

"I thought she had beaten some one of late; she has seemed so gay and
happy. I didn't suppose it was _all_ because I was going away."

"Has she seemed very gay?" Ransom inquired, with a sinking of the heart.
He wore such a long face, as he asked this question, that Mrs. Luna was
again moved to audible mirth, after which she explained:

"Of course I mean gay for her. Everything is relative. With her
impatience for this lecture of her friend's to-night, she's in an
unspeakable state! She can't sit still for three minutes, she goes out
fifteen times a day, and there has been enough arranging and
interviewing, and discussing and telegraphing and advertising, enough
wire-pulling and rushing about, to put an army in the field. What is it
they are always doing to the armies in Europe?--mobilising them? Well,
Verena has been mobilised, and this has been headquarters."

"And shall you go to the Music Hall to-night?"

"For what do you take me? I have no desire to be shrieked at for an
hour."

"No doubt, no doubt, Miss Olive must be in a state," Ransom went on,
rather absently. Then he said, with abruptness, in a different tone: "If
this house has been, as you say, headquarters, how comes it you haven't
seen her?"

"Seen Olive? I have seen nothing else!"

"I mean Miss Tarrant. She must be somewhere--in the place--if she's to
speak to-night."

"Should you like me to go out and look for her? _Il ne manquerait plus
que cela!_" cried Mrs. Luna. "What's the matter with you, Basil Ransom,
and what are you after?" she demanded, with considerable sharpness. She
had tried haughtiness and she had tried humility, but they brought her
equally face to face with a competitor whom she couldn't