s
on at children's play.

Sylvia was a trifle breathless, seeing him disappear so rapidly down
this unexpected path, but she was for the moment spared the effort to
overtake him by the arrival of Tojiko with a tray of fresh mail. "Oh,
letters from home!" Sylvia rejoiced, taking a bulky one and a thin one
from the pile. "The fat one is from Father," she said, holding it up.
"He is like me, terribly given to loquaciousness. We always write each
other reams when we're apart. The little flat one is from Judith. She
never can think of anything to say except that she is still alive and
hopes I am, and that her esteem for me is undiminished. Dear Spartan
Judy!"

"Do you know," said the man opposite her, "if I hadn't met you, I
should have been tempted to believe that the institution of the
family had disappeared. I never saw anything like you Marshalls! You
positively seem to have a real regard for each other in spite of
what Bernard Shaw says about the relations of blood-kin. You even,
incredible as it seems, appear to feel a mutual respect!"

"That's a very pretty compliment indeed," said Sylvia, smiling at him
flashingly, "and I'm going to reward you by reading some of Judith's
letter aloud. Letters do paint personalities so, don't they?"

He settled himself to listen.

"Oh, it won't take long!" she reassured him laughingly. She read:

"'DEAR SYLVIE: Your last letter about the palaces at Versailles was
very interesting. Mother looked you up on the plan of the grounds in
Father's old Baedeker. I'm glad to know you like Paris so much. Our
chief operating surgeon says he thinks the opportunities at the School
of Medicine in Paris are fully as good as in Vienna, and chances for
individual diagnoses greater. Have you visited that yet?'" Over
the letter Sylvia raised a humorous eyebrow at Page, who smiled,
appreciative of the point.

She went on: "'Lawrence is making me a visit of a few days. Isn't he
a queer boy! I got Dr. Wilkinson to agree, as a great favor, to let
Lawrence see a very interesting operation. Right in the middle of it,
Lawrence fainted dead away and had to be carried out. But when he came
to, he said he wouldn't have missed it for anything, and before he
could really sit up he was beginning a poem about the "cruel mercy of
the shining knives."'" Sylvia shook her head. "Isn't that Lawrence!
Isn't that Judith!"

Page agreed thoughtfully, their eyes meeting in a trustful intimacy.
They themselves might h