airily on the top.

"The only word to describe the effect of all this upon me is spree,"
said Mrs. Mansfield. "I am out on the spree."

"Capital! And if I stepped right in to your sort of life," said Heath,
"would it have the same kind of effect upon me?"

"I don't think it could. It's too conscious, too critical, too
fastidious. There's nothing fastidious in a spree. I like the March wind
outside, too--the thought of it."

Suddenly her mind went to Charmian and Algiers.

"Charmian's in the sun," she said.

Directly she said this Heath looked slightly self-conscious.

"Have you heard from her?"

"This morning. She has made great friends with Susan Fleet."

"Yes?"

"Oh, a woman we all like, who often helps Adelaide Shiffney with
things."

"We all like," he repeated.

"A _cliche_! And indeed I scarcely know Susan Fleet. You see what an
absurd close borough I live in, have always lived in. And I never
thoroughly realized that till I met you."

"And I live in loneliness, outside of it all, of everything almost."

Lightly she answered:

"With Mrs. Shiffney and others holding open the door, holding up the
lamp, and imploring you to come in, to come right in as they say on the
other side of the Atlantic."

"You don't do that."

"Do you wish me to?"

"I don't know what I wish. But I am dissatisfied."

He frowned, moving his chair, lit a cigarette, pushed away his coffee
cup.

"What is it like at Algiers?"

"Very beautiful, Charmian says. Adelaide and the others have gone off to
a desert place called Bou-Saada--"

"Bou-Saada!" he said slowly.

"And Charmian and Susan Fleet are up on the hill at Mustapha Superieur.
They've left the yacht for a few days. They are visiting Arab villas and
exploring tropical gardens."

She watched him and sipped her coffee. All the student feeling had gone
from her. And now she was deeply aware of the difference between her age
and Heath's.

"I suppose they won't be back for a good while," he said.

"Oh, I expect them in a week or two."

"So soon?"

"Adelaide is always in a hurry, and this was only to be quite a short
trip."

"Once out there how can they come away so soon? I should want to stay
for months. If I once began really to travel there would never be an end
to it, unless I were not my own master."

"It's quite extraordinary how you master yourself," Mrs. Mansfield said.
"You are a dragon to yourself, and what a fierce unyielding dragon!
It's a fin