as he well knew them in their homes, touched his warm heart, and he
lingered with them to the neglect of younger and fairer faces, until his
host, again at his elbow, in a strenuous whisper admonished him:

"For heaven's sake, Red, don't waste any more of that rare sweetness on
the desert air. Go and lavish your Beau Brummel gallantry on the wives
of our leading citizens. Those new Winterbournes have sackfuls of
money--and a chronic invalid or two always in the family, I'm told. A
little attention there--"

"Clear out," Burns retorted shortly, and deliberately sat down beside the
little, white-haired old lady who reminded him of his mother. As he had
been standing before, this small act was significant, and Macauley, with
a comprehending chuckle, moved away again.

"Might have known that wouldn't work," he assured himself. He strolled
over to Ellen, and when, after some time, he succeeded in getting her
for a moment to himself, he put an interested question.

"What do you think of your husband as a society man? A howling success,
eh? He's been sitting for one quarter of an hour by the side of old Mrs.
Gillis. And a whole roomful of devoted patients, past and future, looking
daggers at him because he ignores them. How's that for business policy,
eh? Can't you bring him to his senses?"

"Are you sure they're looking daggers? I passed Mrs. Gillis and Red just
now, and thought they made a delightful pair. As for business policy,
Jim,--a man who would be good to an old lady would be good to a young
one. Isn't that the natural inference,--if you must think about business
at all at such an affair. I prefer not to think about it at all."

"You may not be thinking about it, but you're capturing friends, right
and left. I've been watching you, and knew by the expression on the faces
of those you were talking to that you were gathering them in and nailing
them fast. How does a woman like you do it?--that's what I'd like to
know!"

"Go and do your duty like a man, Jimmy. Flattering the members of your
own family is not a part of it." Dismissing him with a smile which made
him more than ever eager for her company, she turned away, to devote
herself, as her husband was doing, to the least attractive of the guests.

The evening wore away at last, and at a reasonably early hour the hosts
were free. The last fellow citizen had barely delivered his parting
speech and taken himself off when Red Pepper Burns turned a handspring
in