a prejudice against showing all that he really was, a pity he
had to be known to be appreciated--that is, appreciated by the "right
sort" of people. Of course, the observant few could see him in his face,
which was certainly distinguished--yes, far more distinguished than
Ross's, if not so regularly handsome.

"I've been looking over the old place," Ross was saying, "and I've
decided to ask father to keep it. Theresa doesn't like it here; but I do,
and I can't bring myself to cut the last cords. As I wandered over the
place I found myself getting so sad and sentimental that I hurried away
to escape a fit of the blues."

"We're accustomed to that sort of talk," said Adelaide with a mocking
smile in her delightful eyes. "People who used to live here and come back
on business occasionally always tell us how much more beautiful Saint X
is than any other place on earth. But they take the first train for
Chicago or Cincinnati or anywhere at all."

"So you find it dull here?"

"I?" Adelaide shrugged her charming shoulders slightly. "Not so very. My
life is here--the people, the things I'm used to. I've a sense of peace
that I don't have anywhere else." She gazed dreamily away. "And peace is
the greatest asset."

"The greatest asset," repeated Ross absently. "You are to be envied."

"_I_ think so," assented she, a curious undertone of defiance in her
voice. She had a paniclike impulse to begin to talk of Dory; but, though
she cast about diligently, she could find no way of introducing him that
would not have seemed awkward--pointed and provincially prudish.

"What are you reading?" he asked presently.

She turned the book so that he could see the title. His eyes wandered
from it to linger on her slender white fingers--on the one where a plain
band of gold shone eloquently. It fascinated and angered him; and she saw
it, and was delighted. Her voice had a note of triumph in it as she said,
putting the book on the table beside her, "Foolish, isn't it, to be
reading how to build beautiful houses"--she was going to say, "when one
will probably never build any house at all." She bethought her that this
might sound like a sigh over Dory's poverty and over the might-have-been.
So she ended, "when the weather is so deliciously lazy."

"I know the chap who wrote it," said Ross, "Clever--really unusual
talent. But the fashionable women took him up, made him a toady and a
snob, like the rest of the men of their set. How that sort