n the soft, rich, black silk, with
the scarf of real lace fastened with a brooch of real pearls at the
throat, with the cap of real lace, with the knots of lavender ribbon,
on her fluff of white curls, remaining in the room while the
discussion as to the rates of tea and coffee or sugar or soap went
on. So she slipped with her knitting-work into the dining-room, but
she dropped her ball of white wool, which remained beside the chair
which she had occupied in the sitting-room. She was knitting a white
shawl. She sat beside the dining-table, and continued to knit,
however, pulling furtively on the recreant ball, while her son
ushered somebody into the sitting-room, asked him politely to be
seated, and then closed the door. That prevented her from knitting
anymore, as the wool was held taut. So she finally laid her work on
the table and went out into the hall on her way up-stairs. The door
leading from the hall into the sitting-room was closed, and she
stopped and eyed curiously the hat and coat on the old-fashioned
mahogany table in the hall. She stood looking at them from a distance
of a few feet; then she wrapped her silk draperies closely around her
and slid closer. She passed her hand over the fine texture of the
coat, which was redolent of cigar smoke. She took up the hat. Then
she spied the top card on the little china card-basket on the table,
and took it up. It was Arthur Carroll's. She nodded her head,
remained standing a moment listening to the inaudible murmur of
conversation from the next room, then went up-stairs, to sit down in
her old winged arm-chair, covered with a peacock-pattern chintz, and
read until the visitor should be gone. She was fairly quivering with
astonishment and curiosity. But she was no more astonished than her
son had been when he had opened the front-door and seen Arthur
Carroll standing there. He had almost doubted the evidence of his
eyes, especially when Carroll had accepted his invitation to enter,
and had removed his coat and hat and followed him into the
sitting-room.

"It is a cold night," Anderson said, feeling that he must say
something.

"Very, for the season," replied Carroll, "and I have not yet, in
spite of my long residence North, grown sufficiently accustomed to
the heated houses and unheated out-of-doors to keep my top-coat on
inside, even if I remain only a few minutes."

The sumptuous lining of the coat gleamed as he laid it on the
hall-table; there was something u