. Can't we talk about something
more agreeable? I am afraid I have been making my poor father a little
uncomfortable at home. Mark, I am developing into a little beast."

On the contrary, he thought she had never looked more charming. It is
probable that their recent separation caused him to regard Carrissima
more favourably than when he used to meet her, as a matter of course,
once or twice every week. He had not seen her face for longer than a
month, then only once after two or three months' separation. She came
upon him now as a kind of revelation, the more because of her obvious
anxiety on account of Colonel Faversham. For years he had ever found
her bright and equable; the best of good comrades, but this afternoon
their intercourse seemed for the first time to be touched by emotion.

"Tell me about your plans for the future--if you have made any,"
Carrissima urged.

"Oh, I'm always making plans," he returned, and began to explain his
intention to lookout for rooms in the neighbourhood of Harley
Street--that medical bazaar.

While still at Saint Josephine's Hospital he had made the acquaintance
of Mr. Randolph Messeter, a man considerably older than himself; an
eminent surgeon, who had more than once invited Mark to dinner.
Randolph Messeter frequently came to Saint Josephine's to operate, and
on such occasions Mark always administered the anaesthetic. Messeter
had more than hinted that he might be able to put some work in Mark's
way, and the intention was that he should specialize as an
anaesthetist, at the same time waiting for ordinary patients.
Carrissima listened with the deepest interest, knowing, however, that
his resources would be taxed to the utmost for some time to come. That
he would make his way before very long she did not doubt for an
instant, but how convenient he would in the meantime find her own
income of eight hundred pounds a year!

How willingly, too, would she place it at his service! When he rose to
go away she wished that it were possible to keep him out of Bridget's
reach, because she could not fail to recollect Lawrence's plainly
expressed opinion.

Could it be possible, she wondered, after Mark had left the house, that
Bridget had two strings to her bow? Was she holding Colonel Faversham
on and off until Mark's return to London? Did she intend to make a
last bid for the younger man, and if he eluded her to fall back on the
older one?

For this supposition, however, th