rving."

She was out "egg-nogging," as I used to call it, when Mrs. Sewall
called. I had the room to myself. Mrs. Sewall had never visited my
quarters before. I lit the lamp on our large table, drew up the
Morris-chair near it, straightened our couch-covers, and arranged the
screen around the chiffoniers. Mrs. Sewall was not late. I heard her
motor draw up to the curbing, scarcely a minute after our alarm clock
pointed to the half-hour.

Marie accompanied her mistress up the one flight of stairs to our room.
I heard them outside in the dim corridor, searching for my name among
the various calling cards tacked upon the half-dozen doors. It was
discovered at last. There was a knock. I opened the door.

"That will do," said Mrs. Sewall, addressing herself to Marie, who
turned and disappeared, and then briefly to me, "Good evening."

"Good evening, Mrs. Sewall. Come in," I replied. We did not shake hands.
I offered her the Morris-chair.

"No," she said, "no, thank you. This will do." And she selected a
straight-backed, bedroom chair, as far away as possible from the
friendly circle of the lamp-light. "I'm here only for a moment," she
went on, "on a matter of business."

I procured a similar straight-backed chair and drew it near enough to
converse without too much effort. It was awkward. It was like trying to
play an act on a stage with nothing but two straight chairs in the
middle--no scenery, nothing to elude or soften. Mrs. Sewall, sitting
there before me in her perfect black, a band of white neatly edging her
neck and wrists, veil snugly drawn, gloves tightly clasped, was like
some hermetically sealed package. Her manner was forbidding, her gaze
penetrating.

"So this is where you live!" she remarked.

"Yes, this is where I live," I replied. "It's very quiet, and a most
desirable location."

"Oh! Quiet! Desirable! I see." Then after a pause in which my old
employer looked so sharply at me that I wanted to exclaim, "I know I'm a
little gaunt, but I'm not the least disheartened," she inquired
frowning, "Did you remain in this quiet, desirable place all summer, may
I ask?"

"Well--not all summer. I was away for three weeks--but my room-mate,
Miss Claff, was here. It isn't uncomfortable."

"Where were you then, if not here?"

"Why, resting. I took a vacation," I replied.

"You have been ill," Mrs. Sewall stated with finality, and there was no
kindness in her voice; it expressed instead vexation. "That is ev