you think he has forgotten it?"

"He had, probably, to go out to buy the cakes," he replied, with a touch
upon the bell which was immediately answered by Wilkins bearing the
silver tray. As she rose to make tea, Kemper took the fur boa from her
shoulders and held it for a minute to his nostrils.

"You use the same perfume, I notice," he observed.

She waited until the door had closed upon Wilkins, and then looked up,
smiling, as she handed him his cup.

"There are two things one should never change," she returned, "a perfume
and a lover."

With a laugh he tossed the fur upon the sofa. "By Jove, you've arrived
at the conventional morality at last."

"Is it morality?" she rejoined sweetly, "I thought it was experience."

"Well, any way, you're right and I'm moral," he remarked, "the joy of
living, after all, is not in having a thing, but in wanting it."

"Which proves, as I have said," she concluded, "that one love is as good
as a thousand."

There was a sharp edge of ridicule to his glance; but the words he spoke
were uttered from some mere impulse of audacity.

"I wonder if I taught you that?" he questioned.

Leaning slightly forward she clasped her large white hands upon her
knees; and the position, while she kept it, showed plainly the rounded
ample length of her figure.

"I might tell you the truth--but, after all, why should I?" she
demanded.

An emotional curiosity which was almost as powerful as love flamed in
his face. How much or how little did she feel? he wondered; and the
vanity which was the inspiration of his largest as well as his smallest
passion, dominated for the time all other impressions which she
produced.

"Would it be possible for you to tell the truth if you tried?" he asked.

"I never try--all the harm on earth comes from women telling men the
truth. It is the woman who tells the truth who becomes--a door mat. If I
ever felt myself in danger of speaking the truth--" she hesitated for a
quick breath, while her eyes drew his gaze as by a cord--"I would run
away."

It was his turn to breathe quickly now. "You did run away--once."

"I ran because--" her voice was so low that he felt it like a breath
upon his cheek.

"Because?" he echoed impatiently; and the vehemence in his tone wrought
an immediate change in her seductive attitude. With a laugh that was
almost insolent, she rose to her feet and looked indifferently down upon
him.

"Oh, that's over long ago and we've both fo