s most
encouraging--thanks to you, I'm told--so we are permitted to see
Donald for five minutes. Nellie, my dear, you remember little Nan
Brent, do you not?"

Mrs. McKaye's handsome mouth contracted in a small, automatic smile
that did not extend to her eyes. She acknowledged Nan's "Good-evening,
Mrs. McKaye," with a brief nod, and again favored the girl with
another property smile, between the coming and going of which her
teeth flashed with the swiftness of the opening and closing of a
camera shutter.

"We are _so_ grateful to you, Miss Brent," she murmured. And then,
womanlike, her alert brown eyes, starting their appraisal at Nan's
shoes, roved swiftly and calmly upward, noting every item of her
dress, every soft seductive curve of her healthy young body. Her
glance came to a rest on the girl's face, and for the space of several
seconds they looked at each other frankly while old Hector was saying:

"Aye, grateful indeed, Nan. We shall never be out of your debt. There
are times when a kindness and a sacrifice are all the more welcome
because unexpected, and we had no right to expect this of you. God
bless you, my dear, and remember--I am always your friend."

"Yes, indeed," his wife murmured, in a voice that, lacking his
enthusiasm, conveyed to Nan the information that The Laird spoke for
himself. She tugged gently at her husband's arm; again the automatic
smile; with a cool: "Good-night, Miss Brent. Thank you again--_so_
much," she propelled The Laird toward the hospital entrance. He obeyed
promptly, glad to escape a situation that was painful to him, for he
had realized that which his wife did not credit him with having
sufficiently acute perception to realize--to-wit, that his wife's
camouflage was somewhat frayed and poorly manufactured. _She had not
played the game with him_. It would have cost her nothing to have been
as kindly and sincere as he had been toward this unfortunate girl;
nevertheless, while he had sensed her deficiency, his wife had carried
the affair off so well that he could not advance a sound argument to
convince her of it. So he merely remarked dryly as the hospital door
closed behind them:

"Nellie, I'm going to propound a conundrum for you. Why did your
greeting of the Brent girl remind me of that Louis Quinze tapestry for
which you paid sixty thousand francs the last time you were abroad?"

"I loathe conundrums, Hector," she replied coldly. "I do not care to
guess the answer."

"