elf very tired afterwards. Besides, in the evening
I went to see her act."

"Does she act?" asked Mrs. Dallow.

"She's an actress: it's her profession. Don't you remember her that day
at Peter's in Paris? She's already a celebrity; she has great talent;
she's engaged at a theatre here and is making a sensation. As I tell
you, I saw her last night."

"You needn't tell me," Julia returned, looking up at him with a face of
which the intense, the tragic sadness startled him.

He had been standing before her, but at this he instantly sat down
close, taking her passive hand. "I want to, please; otherwise it must
seem so odd to you. I knew she was coming when I wrote to you the day
before yesterday. But I didn't tell you then because I didn't know how
it would turn out, and I didn't want to exult in advance over a poor
little attempt that might come to nothing. Moreover, it was no use
speaking of the matter at all unless I told you exactly how it had come
about," Nick went on, explaining kindly and copiously. "It was the
result of a visit unexpectedly paid me by Gabriel Nash."

"That man--the man who spoke to me?" Her memory of him shuddered into
life.

"He did what he thought would please you, but I daresay it didn't. You
met him in Paris and didn't like him; so I judged best to hold my tongue
about him."

"Do _you_ like him?"

"Very much."

"Great heaven!" Julia ejaculated, almost under her breath.

"The reason I was annoyed was because, somehow, when you came in, I
suddenly had the air of having got out of those visits and shut myself
up in town to do something that I had kept from you. And I have been
very unhappy till I could explain."

"You don't explain--you can't explain," Mrs Dallow declared, turning on
her companion eyes which, in spite of her studied stillness, expressed
deep excitement. "I knew it--I knew everything; that's why I came."

"It was a sort of second-sight--what they call a brainwave," Nick
smiled.

"I felt uneasy, I felt a kind of call; it came suddenly, yesterday. It
was irresistible; nothing could have kept me this morning."

"That's very serious, but it's still more delightful. You mustn't go
away again," said Nick. "We must stick together--forever and ever."

He put his arm round her, but she detached herself as soon as she felt
its pressure. She rose quickly, moving away, while, mystified, he sat
looking up at her as she had looked a few moments before at him. "I've
thought it