d a waiter imperiously and
given his order.

"My dear Leonard," she protested, "this is shocking extravagance."

"Is it?" he replied. "I don't care. Tell me about the theatre. Were they
kind to you there? Will you be able to keep your place?"

"The girls were all much nicer than I expected," she told him, "and the
musical director said that my voice was much too good for the chorus.
Oh, I do hope that they will keep me!"

"They would be idiots if they didn't," he declared, vigorously. "You
sing better and you dance more gracefully and to me you seemed much
prettier than any one else there."

She laughed into his eyes.

"My dear brother," she exclaimed, "your education is progressing indeed!
It is positively the first evening I have ever heard you attempt to make
pretty speeches, and you are quite an adept already."

"I don't know about that," he protested. "I suppose it never occurred
to me before that you were good-looking," he added, examining her
critically, "or I dare say I should have told you so. You see, one
doesn't notice these things in an ordinary way. Lots of other people
must have told you so, though."

"I was never spoilt with compliments," she said. "You see, I had a
beautiful sister."

The words seemed to have escaped her unconsciously. Almost as they
passed her lips, her expression changed. She shivered, as though
reminded of something unpleasant. Tavernake, however, noticed nothing.
For the greater part of the day he had been sedulously fighting against
a new and unaccustomed state of mind. He had found his thoughts slipping
away, time after time, until he had had to set his teeth and use all
his will power to keep his attention concentrated upon his work. And now
once more they had escaped, again he felt the strange stir in his blood.
The slight flush on his cheek grew suddenly deeper. He looked past the
girl opposite to him, out of the restaurant, across the street, into
that little sitting-room in the Milan Court. It was Elizabeth who was
there in front of him. Again he heard her voice, saw the turn of her
head, the slow, delightful curve of the lips, the eyes that looked into
his and spoke to him the first strange whispers of a new language. His
heart gave a quick throb. He was for the moment transformed, a prisoner
no longer, a different person, indeed, from the stolid, well-behaved
young man who found himself for the first time in his life in these
unaccustomed surroundings. Then Beatri