l the light
carelessness gone from his voice.

"Dear lady, it is good to see you again, but hard to see this," and his
eyes went to her black gown.

Her lips were tremulous. "I know. But when I meet people who knew him,
it does not make me sad; it makes me glad because all of his friends are
my good friends."

"There are two men whom I always place side by side as peers; one is
Anthony Blake and the other your husband. The surgeon and the
scientist----"

"Yes," she said, "and they never met. But Diana knew him--and loved
him."

"And she loves--Anthony----"

Mrs. Martens gave him a startled look. "Hush," she said. "Oh, no, you
mustn't think that."

"Perhaps she doesn't realize," he said, slowly, "but the world can see
it with half an eye. And everybody knows Anthony's devotion."

He stopped short as Diana appeared in the doorway. She wore white lace,
with a crescent of pearls set just above the parting of her dark hair.

Justin was on his feet in a moment. "Diana, the huntress," he said. "You
shouldn't appear like that suddenly on a moonlight night unless you want
to be worshiped as a goddess----"

Diana laughed. "Please don't call me 'the huntress' again. It has a sort
of 'woman still pursued him' sound."

Justin, with Diana, was his light mocking self. With Bettina he had been
self-conscious, with Sophie tenderly sympathetic--but Diana played up,
as it were, to his boyish attitude of adoration.

"Are we all here but Anthony?" she asked, with her eyes sweeping the
length of the porch where the guests had gathered. "He's probably
looking after somebody with appendicitis, or with a broken arm----"

"No, he isn't." Bettina spoke with the assurance of direct knowledge.
"This time it is a man's nose; it had to be sewed up."

She shivered as she said it, and her audience roared.

"I'm glad it's not Bobbie's nose," said Justin, "it's the only really
handsome feature he possesses isn't it, Doris?"

The blushing Doris murmured inarticulately. She thought Bobbie
beautiful, and wondered why any one should designate his nose so
explicitly.

Diana regretted that she had not warned Bettina against such assumption
of intimacy with Anthony. If people were not to know of the engagement,
it was not well--

But Anthony had come, perfectly groomed, from the tips of his white
shoes to the top of his head, and presently he was bending over her
hand, and saying, pleasantly, "It's a jolly lot of us you've got
together,