s the first to recover her composure. "Why, Terry, I thought
you were in bed!"

"I was."

Terry's eyes shifted from Lady Dawn to Tabs. They were startled and
misty with sleep. She seemed only half-awake. Her hand rested on the
door as if ready for retreat. Her square little face was flushed; her
gold, bobbed hair was flattened where it had pressed against the pillow.
She was clad in a filmy negligee; her bare feet had been pushed hastily
into slippers and peeped out rosily from beneath the hem. She looked
immature--the way she had in days gone by when he had tiptoed to her
bedside through the darkness to feel her tight little arms leap
stranglingly about his neck. She had been really a tiny girl then. Why
couldn't she have stayed like that always? Why need she have roused in
him this torturing desire which she did nothing but rebuff?

"I was asleep. I heard voices. I thought----"

What had she thought? How much had she seen and heard? How long had she
been standing there?

Tabs attempted to bridge the awkward silence. "I drove down from
London." Then he added, "That was last night."

None of them had stirred. Lady Dawn advanced from the window into the
pool of lamplight. "I think I know what you thought--that something was
wrong. It was. I nearly fainted. If it hadn't been for Lord
Taborley----But come inside. Why do you remain standing there?"

Terry stepped just across the threshold. Having closed the door, she
leant against it, still holding the knob in her hand. It was plain that
she was making an effort to be valiant. She looked fragile as a peeled
white wand; like a flower, shy and dew-wet. Life had not yet commenced
to break her. The clinging folds of her wrap emphasized her slenderness,
the grace of her lines and the girlish contours of her figure.

Lady Dawn went to her and put her arm about her. "You're afraid. Of what
are you afraid? Surely not of Lord Taborley? He's been telling me---- To
be loved like that---- There was a time when I would have been proud."

Terry's left hand went up to her breast. Her wild violet eyes looked
straight before her, seeking always the face of Tabs. They seemed to
call to him. He came slowly to the table where she could see him. It was
his chance. Lady Dawn was his advocate. It was the chance for which he
had waited.

He was contrasting the two women before him; the one in her dainty,
enviable promise and the dumb hostility of her youth; the other in the
gentleness