not? Isn't he coming to dinner for the first time since--he left New
York, and since he broke off with Eve, and since--a lot of other
things--and isn't it an important occasion, Mistress Anne?"

Anne ignored the question. "What have you written?"

"Only the outline. He comes--has caviar, and his eyes are on the queen.
He drinks his soup--and dreams. He has fish--and a vision of the future;
rhapsodies with the roast," she twinkled; "do you like it?"

"As far as it goes."

"It goes very far, and you know it. And you are blushing."

"I am not."

"You are. Look in the glass. Mistress Anne, aren't you glad that Eve is
married?"

"Yes," honestly, "and that she is happy."

"Pip was made for her. I loved him at Palm Beach, adoring her, didn't
you?"

"Yes." Anne's mind went back to it. The marriage had followed immediately
upon the announcement of the broken engagement. People had pitied poor
young Dr. Brooks. But Anne had not. One does not pity a man who, having
been bound, is free.

He had written to her a half dozen times during the winter, friendly
letters with news of Crossroads, and now that she was again at Rose
Acres, he was coming up.

The spring day was bright. Rich with possibilities. "Marie-Louise, don't
stay in bed. Nobody has a right to be in the house on such a day as
this."

But Marie-Louise wouldn't be moved. "I want to finish my verses."

So Anne went out alone into the garden. It was ablaze with spring bloom,
the river was blue, and Pan piped on his reeds. Geoffrey waved to her
from his balcony. She waved back, then went for a walk alone. She
returned to have tea on the terrace. The day seemed interminable. The
hour for dinner astonishingly remote.

At last, however, it was time to dress. The gown that she chose was of
pale rose, heavily weighted with silver. It hung straight and slim. Her
slippers were of silver, and she still wore her dark hair in the smooth
swept-up fashion which so well became her.

Richard, seeing her approach down the length of the big drawing-room
where he stood with Austin, was conscious of a sense of shock. It was as
if he had expected that she would come to him in her old blue serge, or
in the little white gown with the many ruffles. That she came in such
elegance made her seem--alien. Like Eve. Oh, where was the Anne of
yesterday?

Even when she spoke to him, when her hand was in his, when she walked
beside him on the way to the dining-room, he had this sense of