st was piqued in consequence, and he was in
the mood to dare a good deal.

He would have given much to know what she was thinking of; and the
knowledge would have administered a wholesome shock to his vanity. He
decided to surprise her with the question, and read the answer in her
too expressive face.

"What _is_ the absorbing subject?" he demanded suddenly. His tone was
a sufficient index of his progress during the past fortnight.

She flushed and laughed softly, without looking up; and he drew his
own conclusions.

"I don't tell my thoughts! But I'm sorry if I was rude. I was
thinking, for one thing," she added lightly and mendaciously, "that I
wish it was nearer time to go up to the Hills."

"I don't wonder at that. You're wasted in a place like Kohat."

"That's rubbish!" she rebuked him. But her pleasure in the words was
self-evident.

"And that's modesty!" he capped her promptly, enjoying the deepening
carnation of the cheek turned towards him. "Will it be Murree again
this year?"

"Yes; I suppose so." She spoke without enthusiasm.

"Wouldn't you prefer Simla?"

"Well, naturally--a thousand times."

"Then why not go there? I would come up too, like a shot. I can get a
couple of months this year, and we'd have a ripping time of it. Shall
we call it settled--eh?"

She sighed and shook her head.

"It's too expensive. Besides, there seems to be something wrong with
Simla. My husband doesn't like it much; nor does Honor."

The implication in Kresney's laugh was lost upon Evelyn Desmond.

"Oh, well, of course Simla isn't much of a place for husbands," he
explained loftily, "or for girls. It's the bachelors who have a good
time there,--_and_ the married women."

"Is it? How odd! I should think anybody who cared about dancing and
acting, and all that sort of thing, would be bound to have a lovely
time in Simla."

She looked him so simply and straightly in the face that he felt
unaccountably ashamed of his questionable remark, and the laugh that
had preceded it--a sensation to which he was little accustomed.

"Yes, yes; daresay you're right," he agreed airily. "But if you're so
keen about the place, why not insist upon going? Wives don't trouble
overmuch about obedience nowadays; most of them seem to do whatever
they please."

"Do they? Well, then, I suppose it pleases me to go where my husband
likes best."

"Very dutiful, indeed!" A shadow of a sneer lurked beneath his
bantering tone, and she re