e said, her heart beating faster. "Oh, but
he is 'the best ever,'" she added, repeating Lou's words--"the best
ever!"

Her eye brightened with intention. She ran down the corridor, and
presently made her way to the housekeeper's room.

CHAPTER XII

THE KEY IN THE LOCK

A quarter of an hour later Jasmine softly opened the door of the room
where Jigger lay, and looked in. The nurse stood at the foot of the
bed, listening to talk between Jigger and Ian, the like of which she
had never heard. She was smiling, for Jigger was original, to say the
least of it, and he had a strange, innocent, yet wise philosophy. Ian
sat with his elbows on his knees, hands clasped, leaning towards the
gallant little sufferer, talking like a boy to a boy, and getting
revelations of life of which he had never even dreamed.

Jasmine entered with a little tray in one hand, bearing a bowl of
delicate broth, while under an arm was a puzzle-box, which was one of
the relics of a certain house-party in which a great many smart people
played at the simple life, and sought to find a new sensation in making
believe they were the village rector's brood of innocents. She was
dressed in a gown almost as simple in make as that of the nurse, but of
exquisite material--the soft green velvet which she had worn when she
met Ian in the sweetshop in Regent Street. Her hair was a perfect gold,
wavy and glistening and prettily fine, and her eyes were shining--so
blue, so deep, so alluring.

The boy saw her first, and his eyes grew bigger with welcome and
interest.

"It's her--me lydy," he said with a happy gasp, for she seemed to him
like a being from another sphere. When she came near him the faint,
delicious perfume exhaling from her garments was like those
flower-gardens and scented fields to which he had once been sent for a
holiday by some philanthropic society.

Ian rose as the nurse came forward quickly to relieve Jasmine of the
tray and the box. His first glance was enigmatical--almost
suspicious--then, as he saw the radiance in her face and the burden she
carried, a new light came into his eyes. In this episode of Jigger she
had shown all that gentle charm, sympathy, and human feeling which he
had once believed belonged so much to her. It seemed to him in the old
days that at heart she was simple, generous, and capable of the best
feelings of woman, and of living up to them; and there began to grow at
the back of his mind now the thought th