rst time to the
accompaniment of flashes of lightning. I think she was arrayed in little
blue feathers, but if such a costume is not seemly, I swear there were,
at least, little blue feathers in her too coquettish cap, and that she
was carrying a muff to match. No part of a woman is more dangerous than
her muff, and as muffs are not worn in early autumn, even by invalids, I
saw in a twink, that she had put on all her pretty things to wheedle me.
I am also of opinion that she remembered she had worn blue in the days
when I watched her from the club-window. Undoubtedly Mary is an engaging
little creature, though not my style. She was paler than is her wont,
and had the touching look of one whom it would be easy to break. I
daresay this was a trick. Her skirts made music in my room, but perhaps
this was only because no lady had ever rustled in it before. It was
disquieting to me to reflect that despite her obvious uneasiness, she
was a very artful woman.

With the quickness of David at the switch, I slipped a blotting-pad
over the dedication, and then, "Pray be seated," I said coldly, but she
remained standing, all in a twitter and very much afraid of me, and I
know that her hands were pressed together within the muff. Had there
been any dignified means of escape, I think we would both have taken it.

"I should not have come," she said nervously, and then seemed to wait
for some response, so I bowed.

"I was terrified to come, indeed I was," she assured me with obvious
sincerity.

"But I have come," she finished rather baldly.

"It is an epitome, ma'am," said I, seeing my chance, "of your whole
life," and with that I put her into my elbow-chair.

She began to talk of my adventures with David in the Gardens, and of
some little things I have not mentioned here, that I may have done for
her when I was in a wayward mood, and her voice was as soft as her muff.
She had also an affecting way of pronouncing all her r's as w's, just as
the fairies do. "And so," she said, "as you would not come to me to be
thanked, I have come to you to thank you." Whereupon she thanked me most
abominably. She also slid one of her hands out of the muff, and though
she was smiling her eyes were wet.

"Pooh, ma'am," said I in desperation, but I did not take her hand.

"I am not very strong yet," she said with low cunning. She said this to
make me take her hand, so I took it, and perhaps I patted it a little.
Then I walked brusquely to the win