ll come," Lanfear said, and he passed to the girl's
right; she had taken her father's arm; but he wished to offer more
support if it were needed. When they had climbed to the open flowery
space before the hotel, she seemed aware of the groups of people about.
She took her hand from her father's arm, as if unwilling to attract
their notice by seeming to need its help, and swept up the gravelled
path between him and Lanfear, with her flowing walk.

Her father fell back, as they entered the hotel door, and murmured to
Lanfear: "Will you wait till I come down?" ... "I wanted to tell you
about my daughter," he explained, when he came back after the quarter of
an hour which Lanfear had found rather intense. "It's useless to pretend
you wouldn't have noticed--Had nobody been with you after I left you,
down there?" He twisted his head in the direction of the pavilion, where
they had been breakfasting.

"Yes; Mrs. Bell and her daughters," Lanfear answered, simply.

"Of course! Why do you suppose my daughter denied it?" Mr. Gerald asked.

"I suppose she--had her reasons," Lanfear answered, lamely enough.

"No _reason_, I'm afraid," Mr. Gerald said, and he broke out hopelessly:
"She has her mind sound enough, but not--not her memory. She had
forgotten that they were there! Are you going to stay in San Remo?" he
asked, with an effect of interrupting himself, as if in the wish to put
off something, or to make the ground sure before he went on.

"Why," Lanfear said, "I hadn't thought of it. I stopped--I was going to
Nice--to test the air for a friend who wishes to bring his invalid wife
here, if I approve--but I have just been asking myself why I should go
to Nice when I could stay at San Remo. The place takes my fancy. I'm
something of an invalid myself--at least I'm on my vacation--and I find
a charm in it, if nothing better. Perhaps a charm is enough. It used to
be, in primitive medicine."

He was talking to what he felt was not an undivided attention in Mr.
Gerald, who said, "I'm glad of it," and then added: "I should like to
consult you professionally. I know your reputation in New York--though
I'm not a New-Yorker myself--and I don't know any of the doctors here. I
suppose I've done rather a wild thing in coming off the way I have,
with my daughter; but I felt that I must do something, and I hoped--I
felt as if it were getting away from our trouble. It's most fortunate my
meeting you, if you can look into the case, and he