more than ordinarily refined. That
was the cursory verdict, the superficial thing to see and say; it will
do to go on with. From the way Lindsay looked at her as she spoke, he
might have been suspected of other discoveries, possible only to the
somewhat privileged in this blind world, where intimacy must lend a lens
to find out anything at all.

"You found that they had no selves," he said, and the manner of his
words was encouraging and provocative. His proposition was obscured to
him for the instant by his desire to obtain the very last of her
comment, and it might be seen that this was habitual with him. "But Miss
Hilda Howe has one."

"Is she a lady?" asked Mrs. Barberry.

"I don't know. She's an individual. I prefer to rest my claim for her on
that."

"Your claim to what?" trembled upon Miss Livingstone's lips, but she
closed them instead and turned her head again to listen to Mrs.
Barberry. The turns of Alicia's head had a way of punctuating the
conversations in which she was interested, imparting elegance and
relief.

"I saw her in _A Woman of Honour_, last cold weather," Mrs. Barberry
said; "I took a dinner-party of five girls and five subalterns from the
Fort, and I said, 'Never again!' Fortunately the girls were just out,
and not one of them understood, but those poor boys didn't know where to
look! And no more did I. So disgustingly real."

Alicia's eyes veiled themselves to rest on a ring on her finger, and a
little smile, which was inconsistent with the veiling, hovered about her
lips.

"I was in England last year," she said; "I--I saw _A Woman of Honour_ in
London. What could possibly be done with it by an Australian scratch
company in a Calcutta theatre! Imagination halts."

"Miss Howe did something with it," observed Mr. Lindsay. "That and one
or two other things carried one through last cold weather. One supported
even the gaieties of Christmas week with fortitude, conscious that there
was something to fall back upon. I remember I went to the State ball,
and cheerfully."

"That's saying a good deal, isn't it?" commented Dr. Livingstone,
vaguely aware of an ironical intention. "By Jove, yes."

"Hamilton Bradley is good, too, isn't he?" Mrs. Barberry said. "Such a
magnificent head. I adore him in Shakespeare."

"He knows the conventions, and uses them with security," Lindsay
replied, looking at Alicia; and she, with a little courageous air,
demanded: "Is the story true?"

"The story of t