e
artificial flowers, and a quantity of slips of paper of
all sizes covered with her own enigmatically rounded
handwriting. She put her hand in carefully and
searched--everything was there; and up from the bag came
a scent that made her shut her eyes and laugh with its
power to bring her experiences back to her. She locked
it; carefully again with a quivering sigh--after all she
would not have many hours to wait. Presently an idea came
to her that she thought worth keeping, and she thrust
her hand into her pocket for paper and pencil. She drew
out a crumpled oblong scrap and wrote on the back of it,
then unlocked the little bag again and put it carefully
in. Before it had been only the check of the _Illustrated
Age_ for a fortnight's work; now it was the record of
something valuable.

The train rolled into a black and echoing station as the
light in the carriage began to turn from the uncertain
grayness that came in at the window to the uncertain
yellowness that descended from the roof. Boys ran up and
down the length of the platform in the foggy gaslit
darkness shouting Banbury cakes and newspapers. Elfrida
hated Banbury cakes, but she had a consuming hunger and
bought some. She also hated English newspapers, but lately
some queer new notable Australian things had been appearing
in the _St. George's Gazette_--Cardiff had sent them to
her--and she selected this journal from the damp lot that
hung, over the newsboy's arm, on the chance of a fresh
one. The doors were locked and the train hurried on.
Elfrida ate two of her Banbury cakes with the malediction
that only this British confection can inspire, and bestowed
the rest upon a small boy who eyed her enviously over
the back of an adjoining seat She and the small boy and
his mother had the carriage to themselves.

There was nothing from the unusual Australian contributor
in this number of the _St. George's_, and Elfrida turned
its pages with the bored feeling of knowing what else
she might expect. "Parliamentary Debates," of course,
and the news of London, five lines from America announcing
the burning of a New York hotel with hideous loss of
life, an article on the situation in Persia, and one on
the cultivation of artichokes, "Money," "The Seer of
Hawarden," the foreign markets--book reviews. Elfrida
thought also that she knew what she might expect here,
and that it would be nothing very absorbing. Still, with
a sense of tasting criticism in advance, she let