e seat, Glory," said Polly fretfully; "you are
getting on my nerves, dear."

"Glory," said Drake, "how do the Londoners strike you?"

"Much like other mortals," said Glory; "no better, no worse--only
funnier."

The men laughed at that description, and Glory proceeded to give
imitations of London manners--the high handshake, the "Ha-ha" of the
mumps, the mouthing of the canon, and the mincing of Mr. Golightly.

Drake bellowed with delight; Lord Robert drawled out a long owlish laugh;
Polly Love said spitefully, "You might give us your friend, the new
curate, next, dearest," and then Glory went down like a shot.

"Really," began Drake, "it's not hospital nursing, you know----"

But there were low murmurings of thunder and some large splashes of rain,
and they returned to the ballroom. The doctors and the matrons were gone
by this time; only the nurses and the students remained, and the fun was
becoming furious. One young student was pulling down a girl's hair, and
another was waltzing with his partner carried bodily in his arms.
Somebody lowered the lights, and they danced in a shadow-land; somebody
began to sing, and they all sang in chorus; then somebody began to fling
about paper bags full of tiny white wafers, and the bags burst in the air
like shells, and their contents fell like stars from a falling rocket,
and everybody was covered as with flakes of snow.

Meantime the storm had broken, and above the clash and clang of the
instruments of the band and the rhythmic shuffle of the feet of the
dancers and the clear, joyous notes of their happy singing, there was the
roar of the thunder that rolled over London, and the rattle of the rain
on the glass dome overhead.

Glory was in ecstasies; it was like a mist on Peel Bay at night with the
moon shining through it and the waves dancing to a northwest breeze. It
was like a black and stormy sea outside Contrary, with the gale coming
down from the mountains. And yet it was a world of wonder and enchantment
and beauty, and bright and happy faces.

It was morning when the ball broke up, and then the rain had abated,
though the thunder was still rumbling. The men were to see the girls back
to the hospital, and Glory and Drake sat in a hansom-cab together.

"So you always forget that kind of thing, do you?" he said.

"What kind of thing?" she asked.

"Never mind; _you_ know!"

She had put up the hood of her outdoor cape, but he could still see the
gleam of her gold