arbara sitting by the window with listless hands and
drooping head. She grew still more anxious when at the appointed hour
Rosenthal's messenger rapped at the door and stood silently waiting, his
presence voicing the purpose of his mission, and she heard her mistress
say, without an attempt at explanation: "I am sorry, tell Mr. Mangan,
but the Spanish mantilla is not finished. Some of the other pieces are
ready, but you need not wait. I cannot stop now, even to do them up
properly, but I will bring the mantilla myself to-morrow. Please say so
to Mr. Mangan."

The extreme lassitude of her manner only added to Martha's anxiety and,
as the afternoon wore on, she watched Lady Barbara's every move with
ever-increasing alarm. Now and then her poor mistress would drop her
needle, turn her face to the window, and look out into vacancy, her
mouth quivering as if with some inward thought which she had neither the
will nor the desire to voice aloud.

As the hours lengthened, this mental absorption and growing physical
weariness were followed by a certain nervous tension, so pronounced
that the nurse, accustomed to various forms of feminine breakdowns, had
already determined what remedies to use should the symptoms increase.

That Stephen's visit was responsible for this condition, she now no
longer doubted. What she had intended as a relief had only complicated
the situation. And yet in going over all that had happened and all that
was likely to happen, she became more than ever convinced that either
his visit must be repeated, or that she alone must make the announcement
that had trembled on Stephen's lips. She had recognized, almost from the
first, that despite the relief her mistress had enjoyed in the little
apartment some strong, masculine hand and mind were needed to stem the
tide of further disaster. Her own practical common sense also told her
that their present way of living was far too precarious to be counted
upon. Lady Barbara's position with Rosenthal was but temporary. At any
moment it might be lost, and then would follow another dreary hunt for
work, with all its rebuffs, and sooner or later the delicately nurtured
woman would succumb and go under in a mental or physical collapse, the
hospital her only alternative.

None of these forebodings, it must be said, had filled Lady Barbara's
mind. As long as she continued under Martha's care she could rest in
peace, free from the dread of the drunken step on the stair o