ne going."

"Without the additional tax of literary labour." She was conscious of a
premonitory, apprehensive chill that travelled from the roots of her hair
down her spine, and apparently made its exit at the heels of her Louis
Quinze shoes. "So the 'Social Jottings' column will not appear in the
_Siege Gazette_ after to-day. Good-morning."

"Is that my punishment for insubordination?"

Not a sound in reply. "He must have hung up the receiver and gone away.
Oh, horrid, horrid male superiority!" thought Lady Hannah. "To have been
put under arrest, even to have been ordered out and shot, would be
preferable to being figuratively spanked and put in the corner." She
winked away some more tears, and sniffed a little dejectedly. "And only
the other day he seemed quite pleased with me," she added pensively. Then
she shrugged her shoulders, and rang up the Head Hospital, North Veld
Road.

"Who you-e?"

It was the sing-song voice of the Barala hall-boy.

"I'm Lady Hannah Wrynche. Is the Reverend Mother on duty in the wards
to-day?"

"I go see. You hang-e on."

Lady Hannah hung on until her small remaining stock of patience deserted
her. As she stamped her small feet, longing to accelerate the languid
movements of the hall-boy with a humanely-wielded hatpin, a whisper in the
velvet voice she knew stole across the distance.

"Hannah. Is it you?"

"It's me, Biddy dear."

There was a soft laugh that ended in a sigh. "It is so long since anybody
called me that."

"I wouldn't dare to with you looking at me."

"Am I so formidable of aspect? But go on."

"It's not so easy. But I've had an awful morning. Everybody I like best
down on me like bricks and m----" The speaker gulped a sob.

"You are crying, dear!"

"Not a drop. But if you join in the heckling I shall dribble away and
dissolve in salt water. It's all about those wretched paragraphs of mine
in the _Siege Gazette_. But perhaps you haven't seen it?"

"I have seen it."

"You were quite willing that the _fiancailles_ should be made public....
Indeed, you gave me to understand you desired it."

"I was quite willing. I did wish it."

"Yes.... Thank you, dear; that was what I wanted to hear from you. I
understand now what the one clapping pair of hands must mean to the actor
who is booed by all the rest of the audience. Good-bye, dear."

"Stay.... Who are the persons who disapprove of the announcement?"

"My Bingo, for one. Not that anything the dear old