ow on earth did she get back?"

"Oh, by the next train, I suppose; there were two extra ones for the
FETE. At any rate, I know she's safe on the yacht, though I haven't yet
seen her; but you see it was not my fault," Lily summed up.

"Not your fault that Bertha didn't turn up? My poor child, if only you
don't have to pay for it!" Mrs. Fisher rose--she had seen Mrs. Bry
surging back in her direction. "There's Louisa, and I must be off--oh,
we're on the best of terms externally; we're lunching together; but at
heart it's ME she's lunching on," she explained; and with a last
hand-clasp and a last look, she added: "Remember, I leave her to you;
she's hovering now, ready to take you in."

Lily carried the impression of Mrs. Fisher's leave-taking away with her
from the Casino doors. She had accomplished, before leaving, the first
step toward her reinstatement in Mrs. Bry's good graces. An affable
advance--a vague murmur that they must see more of each other--an
allusive glance to a near future that was felt to include the Duchess as
well as the Sabrina--how easily it was all done, if one possessed the
knack of doing it! She wondered at herself, as she had so often
wondered, that, possessing the knack, she did not more consistently
exercise it. But sometimes she was forgetful--and sometimes, could it be
that she was proud? Today, at any rate, she had been vaguely conscious of
a reason for sinking her pride, had in fact even sunk it to the point of
suggesting to Lord Hubert Dacey, whom she ran across on the Casino steps,
that he might really get the Duchess to dine with the Brys, if SHE
undertook to have them asked on the Sabrina. Lord Hubert had promised his
help, with the readiness on which she could always count: it was his only
way of ever reminding her that he had once been ready to do so much more
for her. Her path, in short, seemed to smooth itself before her as she
advanced; yet the faint stir of uneasiness persisted. Had it been
produced, she wondered, by her chance meeting with Selden? She thought
not--time and change seemed so completely to have relegated him to his
proper distance. The sudden and exquisite reaction from her anxieties had
had the effect of throwing the recent past so far back that even Selden,
as part of it, retained a certain air of unreality. And he had made it so
clear that they were not to meet again; that he had merely dropped down
to Nice for a day or two, and had almost his foot on the