hy don't you leave her to her mother?"

"Because she is utterly unfit to have the care of her." Stella spoke
with very unusual severity. "Since Captain Ermsted's death she seems to
have drifted into a state of hopeless apathy. I can't bear to think of a
susceptible child like Tessa brought up in such an atmosphere."

"Apathetic, is she? Do you often see her?" Monck spoke casually, as he
rolled a cigarette.

"Very seldom. She goes out very little, and then only with the Rajah.
They say she looks ill, but that is not surprising. She doesn't lead a
wholesome life!"

"She keeps up her intimacy with His Excellency then?" Monck still spoke
as if his thoughts were elsewhere.

Stella dismissed the subject with a touch of impatience. She had no
desire to waste any precious moments over idle gossip. "I imagine so,
but I really know very little. I don't encourage Tessa to talk. As you
know, I never could bear the man."

Monck smiled a little. "I know you are discretion itself," he said. "But
you are not to adopt Tessa, mind, whatever the state of her mother's
morals!"

"Ah, but I must do what I can for the poor waif," Stella protested.
"There isn't much that I can do when I am away from you,--not much, I
mean, that is worth while."

"All right," Monck said with finality, "so long as you don't adopt her."

Stella saw that he did not mean to allow Tessa a very large share of her
attention during his leave. She did not dispute the point, knowing that
he could be as adamant when he had formed a resolution.

But she did not feel happy about the child. There was to her something
tragic about Tessa, as if the evil fate that had overtaken the father
brooded like a dark cloud over her also. Her mind was not at rest
concerning her.

In the morning, however, Tessa arrived upon the scene, impudent and
cheerful, and she felt reassured. Her next anxiety became to keep her
from annoying Monck upon whom naturally Tessa's main attention was
centered. Tessa, however, was in an unusually tiresome mood. She
refused to be contented with the society of the ever-patient Peter,
repudiated the bare idea of lesson books, and set herself with fiendish
ingenuity to torment the new-comer into exasperation.

Stella could have wept over her intractability. She had never before
found her difficult to manage. But Netta's perversity and Netta's
devilry were uppermost in her that day, and when at last Monck curtly
ordered her not to worry herself but