"_One must cry to someone!_"

* * * * *

Burton is delighted that I shall write a book!--He wrote at once to my
aunt Emmeline to tell her that I was better. I have her letter with
congratulations in it to-day. Burton does the correspondence with my few
relations, all war working hard in England. I am becoming quite excited,
I long to begin, but there is no use until Maurice finds me a
stenographer. He has heard of two. One a Miss Jenkins, aged
forty--sounds good, but she can only give three hours a day--and I must
have one at my beck and call--There is a second one, a Miss Sharp--but
she is only twenty-three--plain though, Maurice says, and wears horn
spectacles--that should not attract me! She makes bandages all the
evening, but is obliged to work for her living so could come for the
day. She is not out of a job, because she is very expert, but she does
not like her present one. I would have to pay her very highly Maurice
says--I don't mind that, I want the best.--I had better see Miss Sharp,
and judge if I can stand her. She may have a personality I could not
work with. Maurice must bring her to-morrow.

The news to-night is worse.--The banks have sent away all their
securities.--But I shall not leave--one might as well die in a
bombardment as any other way. The English Consul has to know all the
names of the English residents in case of evacuation. But I will not go.

Bertha is making a most fiendish noise, there were two raids last
night,--and she began at six this morning--one gets little sleep. I have
a one horse Victoria now, driven by Methusala; I picked Maurice up at
the Ritz this evening at nine o'clock--there was not a human soul to be
seen in the _Rue de la Paix_, or the _Place Vendome_, or the _Rue
Castiglione_--a city of the dead--And the early June sky full of peace
and soft light.

What does it all mean?

IV

Maurice brought Miss Sharp to-day to interview me. I do not like her
much, but the exhibition she gave me of her speed and accuracy in
short-hand satisfied me and made me see that I should be a fool to look
further. So I have engaged her. She is a small creature, palish with
rather good bright brown hair--She wears horn rimmed spectacles with
yellow glasses in them so I can't see her eyes at all. I judge people by
their eyes. Her hands look as if she had done rather a lot of hard
work--they are so very thin. Her clothes are neat but shabby--that is