it to them, and they are only here for a few days more.
They are going immediately." She was looking at Mrs. Herrick all the
while she was telling her wretched lie, and now she even managed to
smile at her. "I thought how lovely it would be if you could go there
with me. I should like so very much to be in it first with you, to have
you go over it with me and tell me how to take care of it, as it's
always been done. I should hate to do it any disrespect."

Her hostess smiled with ready answer. "Of course I will go down. I
should be glad, but it must be in a day or two. Indeed, perhaps it would
be better for you to have your people first, and I can come down, say
Monday afternoon or Tuesday."

Flora faced this unexpected turn of the matter a little blankly. "Ah,
but the trouble is I can't go down alone."

It was Mrs. Herrick's turn to look blank. "But Mrs. Britton?"

"Mrs. Britton isn't going with me; she can't."

"I see." Mrs. Herrick with a long, soft scrutiny seemed to be taking in
more than Flora's mere words represented. "And you wouldn't put it off
until she can?"

"I couldn't put it off a moment," Flora ended with a little breathless
laugh. "I do so wish you would come down with me this morning, for I
must go, and you see I can't go alone."

Mrs. Herrick, sitting there, composed, in her cool, flowing, white and
violet gown with the red flowers in her lap, still looked at Flora
inquiringly. "But aren't there some women in your party old enough to
make it possible and young enough to take pleasure in it?"

Flora shook her head. "Oh, no," she said. Her house of cards was
tottering. She could not keep up her brave smiling. She knew her
distress must be plain. Indeed, as she looked at Mrs. Herrick she saw
the effect of it. Gaiety still looked at her out of that face, but the
warmth, the spontaneity were gone; and the steady eyes, if anything so
aloof could be suspicious, surely suspected her.

Her heart sank. If only she had told the truth--even so much of it as to
say there was something she could not tell. What she had said was
unworthy not only of herself but of the end she was so desperately
holding out for. Now in the lucid gaze confronting her she knew all her
intentions were taking on a dubious color, stained false, like her
words, under the dark cloud of her own misrepresentation. Yet they were
not false, she knew. Her motives, the end she was struggling for, were
as austere as truth itself. She coul