iss Evers says?"

"I am never drawn in, whatever the thing may be. I go in, or I stay out;
but I am not drawn," said Gordon Wright.

"You were not drawn into coming with Mrs. Vivian and her daughter from
Dresden to this place?"

"I did n't come with them; I came a week later."

"My dear fellow," said Bernard, "that distinction is unworthy of your
habitual candor."

"Well, I was not fascinated; I was not overmastered. I wanted to come to
Baden."

"I have no doubt you did. Had you become very intimate with your friends
in Dresden?"

"I had only seen them three times."

"After which you followed them to this place? Ah, don't say you were not
fascinated!" cried Bernard, laughing and springing to his feet.

CHAPTER VI

That evening, in the gardens of the Kursaal, he renewed acquaintance
with Angela Vivian. Her mother came, as usual, to sit and listen to the
music, accompanied by Blanche Evers, who was in turn attended by Captain
Lovelock. This little party found privacy in the crowd; they seated
themselves in a quiet corner in an angle of one of the barriers of the
terrace, while the movement of the brilliant Baden world went on around
them. Gordon Wright engaged in conversation with Mrs. Vivian, while
Bernard enjoyed an interview with her daughter. This young lady
continued to ignore the fact of their previous meeting, and our hero
said to himself that all he wished was to know what she preferred--he
would rigidly conform to it. He conformed to her present programme; he
had ventured to pronounce the word Siena the evening before, but he
was careful not to pronounce it again. She had her reasons for her own
reserve; he wondered what they were, and it gave him a certain pleasure
to wonder. He enjoyed the consciousness of their having a secret
together, and it became a kind of entertaining suspense to see how long
she would continue to keep it. For himself, he was in no hurry to let
the daylight in; the little incident at Siena had been, in itself, a
charming affair; but Miss Vivian's present attitude gave it a sort of
mystic consecration. He thought she carried it off very well--the theory
that she had not seen him before; last evening she had been slightly
confused, but now she was as self-possessed as if the line she had taken
were a matter of conscience. Why should it be a matter of conscience?
Was she in love with Gordon Wright, and did she wish, in consequence,
to forget--and wish him not to suspec