ow, seemed to harmonise with the very word, Celedon.

"I am so surprised," she said softly--but his dark eyes noted that she
was still busy with her tea paraphernalia--"I scarcely know what to
think, Mr. Querida--"

"Think that I love you--" breathed Querida, his dark and beautiful head
very near to her blond one.

"I--am--thinking of it.... But--"

"Helene," he whispered musically;--and suddenly stiffened in his chair
as the maid came clattering in over the rugless and polished parquet to
announce Mr. Ogilvy, followed _san facon_ by that young man, swinging a
straw hat and a malacca stick.

"Sam!" said the pretty Countess, changing countenance.

"Hello, Helene! How-do, Querida! I heard you were temporarily in town,
dear lady--" He kissed a hand that was as faltering and guilty as the
irresolute eyes she lifted to his.

Ten minutes later Querida took his leave. He dismissed the expensive
taxi which had been devouring time outside, and walked thoughtfully away
down the fashionable street.

Because the machinery had chanced to clog twice did not disturb his
theory; but the trouble with him was local; he was intensely and
personally annoyed, nervous, irritated unspeakably. Because, except for
Valerie, these two, Alma Hind-Willet and Helene d'Enver, were the only
two socially and financially suitable women in whom he took the
slightest physical interest.

There is, in all women, one moment--sometimes repeated--in which a
sudden yielding to caprice sometimes overturns the logical plans laid
out and inexorably followed for half a lifetime. And there was much of
the feminine about Querida.

And it chanced to happen on this day--when no doubt all unsuspected and
unperceived some lurking jettatura had given him the evil eye--that he
passed by hazard through the block where Valerie lived, and saw her
mounting the steps.

"Why, Jose!" she exclaimed, a trifle confused in her smiling cordiality
as he sprang up the steps behind her--for Rita's bitterness, if it had
not aroused in her suspicions, had troubled her in spite of her
declaration of unbelief.

He asked for a cup of tea, and she invited him. Rita was in the room
when they entered; and she stood up coolly, coolly returned Querida's
steady glance and salutation with a glance as calm, as detached, and as
intelligent as a surgeon's.

Neither he nor she referred to his recent call; he was perfectly
self-possessed, entirely amiable with that serene and level good-