Franklin Kane

ng lady in black was not in her place. She might very probably have gone away, and it was odd to think that an impression so strong was probabl

our, and then dressed to receive Miss Harriet Robinson

ed in something, and it was surprising to note how completely in the new she forgot last year's passion. This year it was eugenics and Strauss; the welfare of the race had suddenly engaged her attention, and the menaced future of music. She was slender, erect, and beautif

responsibilities of parenthood and the impermanency of modern musical artifices had been

ng out of touch wit

y accept socially! And the cost of things! My dear, the last time I went to the States I had to pay five hundred fran

Miss Robinson sometimes roused a slight irony in her

n Rome-there is quite a delightful society in Rome-or Flore

thought of Engla

ther than have you unsettled, I would like to have you

ng,' said Althea, wi

he wrong sort of people to accaparer you. We always count, when we want to, we American women of the good type,' said Miss Robin

been told that her gifts and charm demanded a salon, she was inclined to believe it. 'It's only,

self until one does settle. I've found t

f her kind, it meant an escape from displeasing circumstance and a preoccupation almost monastic with the abstract and the ?sthetic. To Althea it had never meant merely that. Her own people in America were fastidious and exclusive; from choice, they considered, but, in reality, partly from necessity; they had never been rich enough or fashionable enough to be exposed to the temptation of great European allia

ever neglected to keep her mind in training; and after dinner she sat down with a stout tome on political economy. She had only got through half a chapter when Amélie came to her a

ise,' said Amélie, 'e

Had she then not gone yet? 'Next door, you say?' she asked. Yes

see her,' said Althea, af

ffer of assistance. But she suddenly felt it an opportunity, for what she could not have said. It was like seein

for every occasion. She drenched her handkerchief, gargled her throat, and, armed with her litt

ressing-table was in confusion, and the scent of cigarette smoke mingled with that of a tall white lily that was placed in a vase on a little table beside the bed. To the well-maided Althea the dis

ill-that you had influenza, and I know just what to do for it. May I give you some medicine? I

ou. I thought it was the chambermaid,' s

an ever, and she more myste

lled. I'm afraid you don't know how to take care of yourself.' She smiled a little, gentle and assured, though inwa

How very kind of you!

the proper number of drops. 'You were feeling ill last night, weren't you?'

t ni

mber? I sat next you

done hardly anything-no shopping, no sight-seeing, and I ought to be back in London to-morrow; but I suppose I'll have to stay in bed for a week; it's very tiresome.'

she inquired, while she took ou

t afford 'em,' said the young lady, with a

fter you as well as a doctor,' Althea assured her. 'I'm used to taking care of people who are ill

e question about Venice and her present destination; but, though so amiable and so gratefu

hough she said that her body felt as though it were being beaten with red-hot hammers, she s

n Buchanan,

a Jakes. You are E

cotch,' said

can. Do you kno

in a more communicative mood. 'I met her in Nice one winter; a very nice, kind woman, who gives most sumpt

mphasis, said that

and, and is great fun and is frightfully well up in everything-pictures, books, music, you know: Americans usually are well up, aren't they? She

as an excessively fashionable and reputedly reckless lady who had divorced one husband and marrie

was going to teach in a college when she went back. She was very poor, quite different from the others. Her father, she told me, kept a shop, but didn't get on at all; and her brother, to whom she was devoted,

everity for the confusion that Miss Buchanan's remarks indicated. With gr

in Dakota, and I've often thought I'd like to go out there for a season; he says the riding is wonderful, and

as Miss Buchanan lifted her hands and pressed them to her brows. 'And

s performed, Miss Buchanan said, 'How kind you are! too kind