y not Blafard's? Quiet---small rooms--not
too respectable--quite fairly cool--good things to eat. Yes; Blafard's!

When she drove up, he was ready in the doorway, his thin brown face
with its keen, half-veiled eyes the picture of composure, but feeling
at heart like a schoolboy off for an exeat. How pretty she was
looking--though pale from London--her dark eyes, her smile! And stepping
quickly to the cab, he said:

"No; I'm getting in--dining at Blafard's, Gyp--a night out!"

It gave him a thrill to walk into that little restaurant behind her; and
passing through its low red rooms to mark the diners turn and stare with
envy--taking him, perhaps, for a different sort of relation. He settled
her into a far corner by a window, where she could see the people and
be seen. He wanted her to be seen; while he himself turned to the world
only the short back wings of his glossy greyish hair. He had no
notion of being disturbed in his enjoyment by the sight of Hivites and
Amorites, or whatever they might be, lapping champagne and shining in
the heat. For, secretly, he was living not only in this evening but in
a certain evening of the past, when, in this very corner, he had dined
with her mother. HIS face then had borne the brunt; hers had been turned
away from inquisition. But he did not speak of this to Gyp.

She drank two full glasses of wine before she told him her news. He took
it with the expression she knew so well--tightening his lips and staring
a little upward. Then he said quietly:

"When?"

"November, Dad."

A shudder, not to be repressed, went through Winton. The very month!
And stretching his hand across the table, he took hers and pressed it
tightly.

"It'll be all right, child; I'm glad."

Clinging to his hand, Gyp murmured:

"I'm not; but I won't be frightened--I promise."

Each was trying to deceive the other; and neither was deceived. But both
were good at putting a calm face on things. Besides, this was "a night
out"--for her, the first since her marriage--of freedom, of feeling
somewhat as she used to feel with all before her in a ballroom of a
world; for him, the unfettered resumption of a dear companionship and a
stealthy revel in the past. After his, "So he's gone to Ostend?" and
his thought: 'He would!' they never alluded to Fiorsen, but talked
of horses, of Mildenham--it seemed to Gyp years since she had been
there--of her childish escapades. And, looking at him quizzically, she
asked:

"W