ead, she put it in the bank and lived on her allowance. She was
not John M. Hurd's daughter for nothing. Her mother, a stiff, lean,
gray woman with a tremendous capacity for being both busy and
uncomfortable and making every one around her share the latter feeling,
had little or nothing to do with Isabel or her friends. She was the
typical Puritan, the salt of a somewhat dour earth, and how Isabel ever
came into her household would be difficult to say. The mother had much
undemonstrative affection for her daughter, but no understanding and
less sympathy. She could never accustom herself to the girl's habit of
facing every problem when it had to be faced but not before; she
herself was used to spying trouble afar off, rushing forth with a sort
of fanatical desperation, and falling upon its breast. John M. Hurd
had selected her for her sterling and saving qualities, and he had
always found her all he could have wished. From her daughter's
viewpoint she left much to be desired, at least in the capacity of a
confidante, and this prerogative had long since been assumed by Miss
Maitland.

That young lady, more reserved than Isabel, usually preferred to
receive rather than to bestow confidences. Only in unusual cases, such
as the one now under contemplation, was Helen moved to such downright
speech. But in this instance she acknowledged the presence of an
irritation alien to her customary serenity, and unconsciously she hit
on conversation as a soothing influence. Thus it chanced that the talk
was still on Pelgram when the doorbell rang and the butler announced
that Mr. Wilkinson was calling.

"I believe I could write a manual of artistic courtship," concluded
Miss Maitland, "with a glossary embracing every shade of every color of
an artist's mood. Charlie Wilkinson was absurd, of course, the other
day, with his 'nuances,' but he was amazingly near the truth at the
same time, for all that. Isabel, I'm sick and tired of nuances--I
confess it freely."

"Well," said her friend, soothingly, "here is Charlie now. He ought to
be a fine antidote, for Heaven knows he hasn't a nuance in his entire
anatomy."

Mr. Wilkinson entered.

"My dear Isabel," he said reproachfully, as he shook hands, "I couldn't
help hearing most of what you were just saying about me, and I assure
you that I feel deeply flattered, but at the same time a little hurt.
I dislike to be denied the possession of anything, even an abstract
quality,