th disappointment.
Still, they were patients of the doctor she was perhaps going to work
for; there was a chance that she might learn something more. She sat
turning over in her mind all she had overheard. Though not
particularly worldly wise, she was no fool, and while she was not quite
clear about the situation of these two and their relations to each
other, the various implications they had let fall were not entirely
lost on her.

She had not seen the last of the Captain, as it happened. Five minutes
later she caught sight of him sauntering about near the entrance with a
vacant eye and a restless manner. Simultaneously there approached her
corner a short, enormously fat, overdressed woman, barging aggressively
ahead towards the vacant table, her huge bosom well in advance like the
prow of a ship. As the swarthy face drew nearer she saw that it and
the bosom belonged to the Spanish woman of the Carlton--no doubt the
very one who was trying to entice the young man to the Argentine. Yes,
and there was the daughter coming in her wake, a clumsily built girl in
pink satin, her swart arms bare to the shoulder. The elder woman
attacked the waiter almost bodily, and in hard, guttural French
commanded him to move the table closer to the dancing floor--an
operation causing considerable annoyance to the surrounding guests.
For a moment the Spaniard pressed her hulk so close to Esther that the
latter was nearly choked with the fumes of her chypre. Then suddenly
there was a shriek of delight. The lady, as Esther expressed it to
herself, had discovered her "boy friend."

"What will be the end of it?" wondered Esther as she paid her bill and
rose to go. "Which of these two women is going to get her way?"

With amusement she watched the stolid daughter led away by a
"professional" to dance the tango, leaving her mother in eager
conversation with the Englishman, tapping his arm with her pudgy hand,
her black eyes like burnt holes in the whiteness of her powdered face.
Then she threaded her way out of the restaurant and through the main
entrance of the Casino.

When she reached her hotel the sallow clerk called to her as she passed
his desk.

"Oh, Mees, I have here a note for you. It has just arrived."

She tore open the envelope. It contained two lines in a small,
slovenly hand, on thick, engraved paper.

"Dr. Sartorius will expect Nurse Rowe to-morrow, Wednesday, at nine in
the morning."

So that was that!