le.

She was driving rapidly, chattering incessantly, but in such a gay and
light fashion that Prescott's attention never wandered from herself--the
red glow of her cheeks, the changing light of her eyes and the
occasional gleam of white teeth as her lips parted in a laugh. Thus he
did not notice that she was taking him by a long road, and that one or
two whom they passed on the street looked after them in meaning fashion.

Prescott was not in love with Mrs. Markham, but he was charmed. Hers was
a soft and soothing touch after a hard blow. A healing hand was
outstretched to him by a beautiful woman who would be adorable to make
love to--if she did not already belong to another man, such an old
curmudgeon as General Markham, too! How tightly curled the tiny ringlets
on her neck! He was sitting so close that he could not help seeing them
and now and then they moved lightly under his breath.

He remembered that they were a long time in reaching the shop, but he
did not care and said nothing. When they arrived at last she asked him
to hold the lines while she went inside. She returned in a few minutes
and triumphantly held up a small package.

"See," she said, "I have made my purchase, but it was the last they had,
and no one can say when Richmond will be able to import another paper of
pins. Maybe we shall have to ask General Grant."

"And then he won't let us," said Prescott.

She laughed and glanced up at him from under the long, curling
eyelashes. The green tints showed faintly in her eyes and were
singularly seductive. She made no effort to conceal her high good
humour, and Prescott now and then felt her warm breath on his cheek as
she turned to speak to him in intimate fashion.

She drove back by a road not the same, but as long as before, and
Prescott found it all too short. His gloom fled away before her flow of
spirits, her warm and intimate manner, and the town, though under gray
November skies, became vivid with light and colour.

"Do you know," she said, "that the Mosaic Club meets again to-night and
perhaps for the last time? Are you not coming?"

"I am not invited."

"But I invite you. I have full authority as a member and an official of
the club."

"I'm all alone," said Prescott.

"And so am I," said she. "The General, you know, is at the front, and no
one has been polite enough yet to ask to take me."

Her look met his with a charming innocence like that of a young girl,
but the lurking green