m?"

"You don't look the worse for wear--not the wreck I expected to behold."

"Ah, you should have seen me before I saw you."

"Thank you. I have no doubt you find the sight of my dear face as
refreshing as your favorite cocktail. I suppose that is why it has
taken you three days after your return to reach me and then by special
request."

"A pleasure delayed is twice a pleasure anticipation and realization."

Miss Balfour made a different application of his text, her eyes trained
on him with apparent indifference. "I've been enjoying a delayed
pleasure myself. I went to see her this afternoon."

He did not ask whom, but his eyes brightened.

"She's worth a good deal of seeing, don't you think?"

"Oh, I'm in love with her, but it doesn't follow you ought to be."

"Am I?"--he smiled.

"You are either in love or else you ought to be ashamed of yourself."

"An interesting thing about you is your point of view. Now, anybody
else would tell me I ought to be ashamed if I am in love."

"I'm not worried about your morals," she scoffed. "It's that poor child
I'm thinking of."

"I think of her a good deal, too."

"Ah! and does she think of you a good deal That's what we must guard
against."

"Is it?"

"Yes. You see I'm her confidante." She told it him with sparkling eyes,
for the piquancy of it amused her. Not every engaged young woman can
hear her lover's praises sung by the woman whose life he has saved with
the proper amount of romance.

"Really?"

She nodded, laughing at him. "I didn't get a chance to tell her about
me."

"I suppose not."

"I think I'll tell her about you, though--just what a ruthless
barbarian you are."

His eyes gleamed "I wish you would. I'd like to find out whether she
would believe you. I have tried to tell her myself, but the honest
truth is, I funk it."

"You haven't any right to let her know you are interested in her." She
interrupted him before he could speak. "Don't trifle with her, Waring.
She's not like other girls."

He met her look gravely. "I wouldn't trifle with her for any reason."

Her quick rejoinder overlapped his sentence. "Then you love her!"

"Is that an alternative?"

"With you--yes."

"Faith, my lady, you're frank!"

"I'm not mealy-mouthed. You don't think yourself scrupulous, do you?"

"I'm afraid I am not."

"I don't mind so much your being in love with HER, though it's not
flattering to my vanity, but--" She stopped, letting him make the
i