the floor, I'll call the meeting to
order," said Mrs. Farrinder.

The girl looked at her with extraordinary candour and confidence. "If I
could only hear you first--just to give me an atmosphere."

"I've got no atmosphere; there's very little of the Indian summer about
_me_! I deal with facts--hard facts," Mrs. Farrinder replied. "Have you
ever heard me? If so, you know how crisp I am."

"Heard you? I've lived on you! It's so much to me to see you. Ask mother
if it ain't!" She had expressed herself, from the first word she
uttered, with a promptness and assurance which gave almost the
impression of a lesson rehearsed in advance. And yet there was a strange
spontaneity in her manner, and an air of artless enthusiasm, of personal
purity. If she was theatrical, she was naturally theatrical. She looked
up at Mrs. Farrinder with all her emotion in her smiling eyes. This lady
had been the object of many ovations; it was familiar to her that the
collective heart of her sex had gone forth to her; but, visibly, she was
puzzled by this unforeseen embodiment of gratitude and fluency, and her
eyes wandered over the girl with a certain reserve, while, within the
depth of her eminently public manner, she asked herself whether Miss
Tarrant were a remarkable young woman or only a forward minx. She found
a response which committed her to neither view; she only said, "We want
the young--of course we want the young!"

"Who is that charming creature?" Basil Ransom heard his cousin ask, in a
grave, lowered tone, of Matthias Pardon, the young man who had brought
Miss Tarrant forward. He didn't know whether Miss Chancellor knew him,
or whether her curiosity had pushed her to boldness. Ransom was near the
pair, and had the benefit of Mr. Pardon's answer.

"The daughter of Doctor Tarrant, the mesmeric healer--Miss Verena. She's
a high-class speaker."

"What do you mean?" Olive asked. "Does she give public addresses?"

"Oh yes, she has had quite a career in the West. I heard her last spring
at Topeka. They call it inspirational. I don't know what it is--only
it's exquisite; so fresh and poetical. She has to have her father to
start her up. It seems to pass into her." And Mr. Pardon indulged in a
gesture intended to signify the passage.

Olive Chancellor made no rejoinder save a low, impatient sigh; she
transferred her attention to the girl, who now held Mrs. Farrinder's
hand in both her own, and was pleading with her just to prelude a