putation is always that
one, the possessor, who has the best means of knowing that it is not
true.

In bed no sleep came to soothe her; that gentle thing being the very
middle-of-summer friend in this respect of flying away at the merest
troublous cloud. After lying awake till two o'clock an idea seemed to
strike her. She softly arose, got a light, and fetched a Chess Praxis
from the library. Returning and sitting up in bed, she diligently
studied the volume till the clock struck five, and her eyelids felt
thick and heavy. She then extinguished the light and lay down again.

'You look pale, Elfride,' said Mrs. Swancourt the next morning at
breakfast. 'Isn't she, cousin Harry?'

A young girl who is scarcely ill at all can hardly help becoming so when
regarded as such by all eyes turning upon her at the table in obedience
to some remark. Everybody looked at Elfride. She certainly was pale.

'Am I pale?' she said with a faint smile. 'I did not sleep much. I could
not get rid of armies of bishops and knights, try how I would.'

'Chess is a bad thing just before bedtime; especially for excitable
people like yourself, dear. Don't ever play late again.'

'I'll play early instead. Cousin Knight,' she said in imitation of Mrs.
Swancourt, 'will you oblige me in something?'

'Even to half my kingdom.'

'Well, it is to play one game more.'

'When?'

'Now, instantly; the moment we have breakfasted.'

'Nonsense, Elfride,' said her father. 'Making yourself a slave to the
game like that.'

'But I want to, papa! Honestly, I am restless at having been so
ignominiously overcome. And Mr. Knight doesn't mind. So what harm can
there be?'

'Let us play, by all means, if you wish it,' said Knight.

So, when breakfast was over, the combatants withdrew to the quiet of the
library, and the door was closed. Elfride seemed to have an idea
that her conduct was rather ill-regulated and startlingly free from
conventional restraint. And worse, she fancied upon Knight's face a
slightly amused look at her proceedings.

'You think me foolish, I suppose,' she said recklessly; 'but I want to
do my very best just once, and see whether I can overcome you.'

'Certainly: nothing more natural. Though I am afraid it is not the plan
adopted by women of the world after a defeat.'

'Why, pray?'

'Because they know that as good as overcoming is skill in effacing
recollection of being overcome, and turn their attention to that
entirely.'

'I