id.

"I shall get up for dinner after all," she said. "I mean, I shan't. . . .
I don't know what I'm talking about. What--I mean--is: I shall get out
of _bed_ for dinner, but I shan't go down. _That's_ clear, isn't it?
What's the time?"

"Eight o'clock, my lady."

Then her dream had lasted less than five minutes. . . .

"I'm going to sleep. I shan't want any dinner. Will you bring the
telephone in here?"

The maid left the room in bewilderment at the conflicting orders and
sought counsel of the housekeeper. Ten minutes later Lady Crawleigh came
in to find Barbara in bed with the telephone tucked under one arm and
the receiver to her ear. She finished some request for an address,
nodded as the answer was given and lifted the instrument to a table by
her side.

"Well, my dear, you seem to have given poor Merton a fright," said Lady
Crawleigh. "Is anything the matter?"

"I never felt better in my life," answered Barbara.

"Are you coming down to dinner?"

"I don't think I'm well enough for that. . . . You can get on without
me. If things seem to hang fire, get Gerry Deganway to give imitations
of His Excellency."

Lady Crawleigh bridled at the suggestion.

"That's not at all a respectful way to speak of your father," she
observed reprovingly.

"Well, His ex-Excellency, then. That no better? Sorry. He's very
amusing--Gerry, I mean. Why not get father to give imitations of Gerry?
In its way, that ought to be just as funny."

Her mother advanced reproachfully to the bed and laid her hand upon the
rail.

"_If_ you're not feeling well," she said with incontrovertible logic,
"you ought to go to sleep instead of telephoning to people and writing
to people. If you're all right, you ought to help with these tiresome
creatures. They're _your_ guests."

Barbara felt her own pulse and sighed.

"I'm well enough to write one letter," she said, "and perhaps to get up
in time for lunch to-morrow."

Then she hunted among the pillows for a pencil and addressed an envelope
to "_Eric Lane Esq^{re}, Lashmar Mill-House, Lashmar, Near Winchester,
Hants_."

She was already tired; perhaps, if she could fix her thoughts on Eric
until she fell asleep, she would be spared a second vision of judgement.
A dressing-gong sounded in the distance, and she debated whether to
abandon her letter to Eric and go down. Gerald Deganway would be
simperingly sympathetic. "Your mother tells me you're not feeling very
grand" (odious phrase).