alone, and anxiously
peering up and down all the cross streets, evidently on the lookout, but
he failed to put in an appearance."

"Which was very unkind of him, if she expected that he would," put in
Miss Flower, glancing from under her long lashes at the speaker.

"That is so," returned Quivey; "for the fellow does nothing else, I do
believe, but play lackey to Miss Jorgensen; and if that is his sole
occupation, he ought to perform that duty faithfully. I do not see, for
my part, how he pays his way."

"Perhaps it pays him to be a lackey," I suggested, remembering what I
had once overheard between them. Mrs. Mason gave me a cautioning glance,
which she need not have done, for I had no intention of making known
Miss Jorgensen's secrets.

"Well," said Miss Flower, as if she had been debating the question in
her mind for some time previous, "I doubt if a woman can love a man who
submits to her will as subserviently as Mr. Hurst seems to, to Miss
Jorgensen. I know _some women_ could not."

"By which you mean _you_ could not," Mrs. Mason returned, smiling. "I do
not see that the case need be very different with men. Subserviency
never won anybody's respect or love either. Neither does willful
opposition, any more. Proper self-respect and a fair share of self-love
is more sure of winning admiration, from men or women, than too little
self-assertion or too much."

"But where the self-assertion is all on one side, and the self-abasement
all on the other--as in the case of Miss Jorgensen and Mr. Hurst--then
how would you establish an equilibrium, Mrs. Mason?"

"It establishes itself in that case, I should say," clipped in Mr.
Quivey. "Oil and water do not mix, but each keeps its own place
perfectly, and without disturbance."

I do not know how long this conversation might have gone on in this
half-earnest, half-facetious style, with Miss Jorgensen for its object,
had not something happened just here to bring it abruptly to a close;
and that something was the report of a pistol over our very heads.

"Great heaven!" ejaculated Miss Flower, losing all her color and
self-possession together.

"E. E., as I live--she has shot herself!" cried Quivey, half doubting,
half convinced.

I caught these words as I made a rapid movement toward the staircase.
They struck me as so undeniably true that I never hesitated in making an
assault upon her door. It was locked on the inside, and I could hear
nothing except a faint moanin