ession on it. But
then it looked insincere, meretricious, affected, and always haggard.

For a minute Charmian hesitated, almost resolved to go back to bed. But,
oh, the dulness of the long evening shut in there! Three hours ago, at
Charing Cross Station, she had looked forward to it. But now!

Only once in her life had Charmian made up her face. She knew many girls
who disfigured their youth by concealing it with artifice. She thought
them rather absurd and rather horrid. Nevertheless she had rouge and
powder. One day she had bought them, shut herself in, made up her face,
and been thoroughly disgusted with the effect. Yes, but she had done it
in a hurry, without care. She had known she was not going to be seen.

Softly she pulled out a drawer.

At half-past seven there was a knock at the door. She opened it and saw
her maid.

"If you please, miss, Mrs. Mansfield wishes to know whether you feel
rested enough to dine downstairs."

"Yes, I do. Just tell mother, and then come back, please, Halton."

When Halton came Charmian watched her almost as a cat does a mouse, and
presently surprised an inquiring look that degenerated into a look of
suspicion.

"What's the matter, Halton?"

"Nothing, miss. Which dress will you wear?"

So Halton had guessed, or had suspected--there was not much difference
between the two mental processes.

"The green one I took on the yacht."

"Yes, miss."

"Or the--wait a minute."

"Yes, miss?"

"Yes--the green one."

When the maid had taken the dress out Charmian said: "Why did you look
at me as you did just now, Halton? I wish to know."

"I don't know, miss."

"Well, I have put something on."

"Yes, miss."

"I looked so sea-sick--yellow. No one wants to look yellow."

"No, I'm sure, miss."

"But I don't want--come and help me, Halton. I believe you know things I
don't."

Halton had been with the lovely Mrs. Charlton Hoey before she came to
Charmian, and she did know things unknown to her young mistress.
Trusted, she was ready to reveal them, and Charmian went downstairs at
three minutes past eight more ingenious than she had been at ten minutes
before that hour.

Although she was quite, quite certain that neither her mother nor Claude
Heath would discover what had been done with Halton's assistance, she
was nevertheless sufficiently uncertain to feel a tremor as she put her
hand on the drawing-room door, and it was a tremor in which a sense of
shame had a part.