. My head feels all light and
empty."

She put up her hands to her temples.

"It's as if everything in my poor little brain-box had been shaken
about."

"Poor child! And I've been very inconsiderate."

"Inconsiderate? How?"

"About to-night."

"You haven't accepted a party for me?"

"It isn't so bad as that. But I've invited someone to dinner."

"Mother!" Charmian looked genuinely surprised. "Not Aunt Kitty!"

Aunt Kitty was a sister of Mrs. Mansfield's whom Charmian disliked.

"Oh, no--Claude Heath."

After a slight but perceptible pause, Charmian said:

"Mr. Heath. Oh, you asked him for to-night before you knew I should be
here. I see."

"No, I didn't. I thought he would like to hear about your African
experiences. I asked him after your telegram came."

Charmian got up slowly, and stood where she could see herself in a
mirror without seeming intent on looking in the glass. Her glance to it
was very swift and surreptitious, and she spoke, to cover it perhaps.

"I'm afraid I've got very little to tell about Algiers that could
interest Mr. Heath. Would you mind very much if I gave it up and dined
in bed?"

"Do just as you like. It was stupid of me to ask him. I suppose I acted
on impulse without thinking first."

"What time is dinner?"

"Eight as usual."

"I'll lie down and rest and then see how I feel. I'll go now. Nice to be
with you again, dearest Madre!"

She bent down and kissed her mother's cheek. The touch of her lips just
then was not quite pleasant to Mrs. Mansfield. When she was in her
bedroom alone, Charmian took off her hat, and, without touching her
hair, looked long and earnestly into the glass that stood on her
dressing-table. Then she bent down and put her face close to the glass.

"I look dreadful!" was her comment.

Her maid knocked at the door and was sent away. Charmian undressed
herself, got into bed, and lay very still. She felt very interesting,
and as if she were going to be involved in interesting and strange
events, as if destiny were at work, and were selecting instruments to
help on the coming of that which had to be. She thought of her mother as
one of these instruments.

It was strange that her mother should have been moved to ask Claude
Heath, the man she meant to marry, to come to the house alone on the
evening of her return. This action was not a very natural one on her
mother's part. It had always been tacitly understood that Heath was Mrs.
Mansfield's fr