eyes.

"Is it Mr. Craven?" she asked in a quavering voice.

"Mr. Craven--no! You know him already."

"I have seen him once, dear."

"Come along!"

Miss Cronin followed her into the lobby. The door of the sitting-room
was open, and by the fire was standing a stalwart-looking man in a dark
blue overcoat. As Miss Cronin came in he gazed at her, and she thought
she had never before seen such a pair of matching brown eyes. Beryl
introduced him as Mr. Arabian.

The stranger bowed, and then pressed Miss Cronin's freckled right hand
gently, but strongly too.

"I have been hoping to meet you," he said, in a strong but gentle voice
which had, Miss Cronin thought, almost caressing inflexions.

"Very glad to meet you, indeed!" said the companion.

"Yes. Miss Van Tuyn has told me what you are to her."

"Forgive me for a minute!" said Miss Van Tuyn. "I must take off my
things. They all feel as if they were full of fog. Fanny, entertain Mr.
Arabian until I come back. But don't talk about Bourget. He's never read
Bourget, I'm sure."

She looked at Fanny Cronin and went out of the room. And in that
look old Fanny, slow in the uptake though she undoubtedly was, read a
tremendous piece of news.

This must be the Wallace Collection!

That was how her mind put it. This must be the great reason of Beryl's
lingering in London, this total stranger of whom she had never heard
till this moment. Her instinct had not deceived her. Beryl had at last
fallen in love. And probably Mr. Braybrooke had been aware of it when he
had called that afternoon and talked so persistently about the changes
and chances of life. In that case Miss Cronin had wronged him. And he
had perhaps come to plead the cause of another.

"The weather--it is really terrible, is it not? You are wise to stay in
the warm."

So the conversation began between Miss Cronin and Arabian, and it
continued for quite a quarter of an hour. Then Miss Van Tuyn came back
in a tea gown, looking lovely with her uncovered hair and her shining,
excited eyes, and some twenty minutes later Arabian went away.

When he had gone Miss Van Tuyn said carelessly:

"Fanny, darling, what do you think of him?"

Fanny, darling! That was not Beryl's usual way of putting things. Miss
Cronin was much shaken. She felt the ground of her life, as it were,
rocking beneath her feet, and yet she answered--she could not help it:

"I think Mr. Arabian is the most--the most--he is fascinating. He is