was seized
by a sudden perverse curiosity to know how the two colourless shrinking
victims of young Silverton's sentimental experiments meant to cope with
the grim necessity which lurked so close to her own threshold.

"I don't know--I am trying to find something for them. Miss Jane reads
aloud very nicely--but it's so hard to find any one who is willing to be
read to. And Miss Annie paints a little----"

"Oh, I know--apple-blossoms on blotting-paper; just the kind of thing I
shall be doing myself before long!" exclaimed Lily, starting up with a
vehemence of movement that threatened destruction to Miss Farish's
fragile tea-table.

Lily bent over to steady the cups; then she sank back into her seat.
"I'd forgotten there was no room to dash about in--how beautifully one
does have to behave in a small flat! Oh, Gerty, I wasn't meant to be
good," she sighed out incoherently.

Gerty lifted an apprehensive look to her pale face, in which the eyes
shone with a peculiar sleepless lustre.

"You look horribly tired, Lily; take your tea, and let me give you this
cushion to lean against."

Miss Bart accepted the cup of tea, but put back the cushion with an
impatient hand.

"Don't give me that! I don't want to lean back--I shall go to sleep if I
do."

"Well, why not, dear? I'll be as quiet as a mouse," Gerty urged
affectionately.

"No--no; don't be quiet; talk to me--keep me awake! I don't sleep at
night, and in the afternoon a dreadful drowsiness creeps over me."

"You don't sleep at night? Since when?"

"I don't know--I can't remember." She rose and put the empty cup on the
tea-tray. "Another, and stronger, please; if I don't keep awake now I
shall see horrors tonight--perfect horrors!"

"But they'll be worse if you drink too much tea."

"No, no--give it to me; and don't preach, please," Lily returned
imperiously. Her voice had a dangerous edge, and Gerty noticed that her
hand shook as she held it out to receive the second cup.

"But you look so tired: I'm sure you must be ill----"

Miss Bart set down her cup with a start. "Do I look ill? Does my face
show it?" She rose and walked quickly toward the little mirror above the
writing-table. "What a horrid looking-glass--it's all blotched and
discoloured. Any one would look ghastly in it!" She turned back, fixing
her plaintive eyes on Gerty. "You stupid dear, why do you say such odious
things to me? It's enough to make one ill to be told one looks so! And
looking i