intently as she unfastened her veil and took it off. The brim of her hat
was narrow and left her face fully exposed.

It was Christine Dallas--a girl no longer, no longer blooming and
childlike and wondering--but saddened, matured, mysteriously changed,
with more than the old charm for him in her exquisite woman-face. It
was turned to him in profile, distinct against the distant sky, and
the remembered eyes were veiled by their dark-fringed lids, as she
looked down upon her child.

The veil, ingeniously fastened with a few pins, proved a convenient
awning. She laid her arm above it on the rail, as she bent her head
toward the baby. Although the eyes were hid, the mouth--in her a feature
of extreme sensitiveness--told the story of past suffering and present
pain.

What a face! No artist had ever had a model such as that before him,
and the pale attenuation of the sick child was almost as interesting a
subject. But Noel never thought of it. For once the artist in him became
subservient, and he looked on with no feeling but a pity so great that
it absolutely filled his heart and left no room for any other.

The mother's suffering face put on a smile, and she made a little
kissing sound with her lips to try to attract the baby's notice, and
rouse it from its apathy.

"Mother's precious little pigeon," she said caressingly, and catching
the thin little face between her soft thumb and forefinger and giving it
a loving twitch. But, instead of smiling back at her, a piteous little
tremor came around the baby's mouth. His thin forehead wrinkled and he
began to whimper.

She caught him to her heart with a motion of passionate love and pity,
and began to rock her body to and fro as she held him there.

"Did mother hurt her baby?" she said, speaking in low tones of keenest
self-reproach. "There, then, mother wouldn't trouble him any more!
Mother was bad and naughty to try to make her boy laugh when he was so
sick! Mother loves her baby, that she does, and when her little man gets
well he'll play and laugh with mother then, won't he?"

The whimper died away, and when the soft crooning and rocking had
continued a little while the baby dropped its weary lids and slept. She
laid him in her lap, raising her knee to elevate his head, by resting
her foot on the round of a chair. He sank into his new position with a
tremulous sigh, and slept on. And as he slept she watched him, her great
eyes fastened on his thin little face wit