e haste about it, if you expect to keep me here,"
said Mr. Sparks, with a peculiar expression in his eye. He was eager to
get home, having important business to attend to in the West.

"Oh, papa, be quiet! I shall find somebody at Bellagio. Why, darling,
are you still in mourning?"

She had forgotten that Jacqueline had lost her father. Probably she
would not have thought it necessary to wear black so long for Mr.
Sparks. Meantime, Madame Strahlberg and her sister had left the room.

"When are they coming back?" said Jacqueline, growing very nervous. "It
seems to me this clock must be wrong. It says half-past nine. I am sure
it must be later than that."

"Half-past nine!--why, it is past eleven," replied Miss Nora, with a
giggle. "Do you suppose they pay any attention to clocks in this house?
Everything here is topsy-turvy."

"Oh! what shall I do?" sighed poor Jacqueline, on the verge of tears.

"Why, do they keep you such a prisoner as that? Can't you come in a
little late--"

"They wouldn't open the doors--they never open the doors on any pretext
after ten o'clock," cried Jacqueline, beside herself.

"Then your nuns must be savages? You should teach them better."

"Don't be worried, dear little one, you can sleep on this sofa," said
Madame Odinska, kindly.

To whom had she not offered that useful sofa? Wanda and Colette were
just as ready to propose that others should spend the night with them
as, on the smallest pretext, to accept the same hospitality from others.
Wanda, indeed, always slept curled up like a cat on a divan, in a fur
wrapper, which she put on early in the evening when she wanted to smoke
cigarettes. She went to sleep at no regular hour. A bear's skin was
placed always within her reach, so that if she were cold she could draw
it over her. Jacqueline, not being accustomed to these Polish fashions,
did not seem to be much attracted by the offer of the sofa. She blamed
herself bitterly for her own folly in having got herself into a scrape
which might lead to serious consequences.

But this was neither time nor place for expressions of anxiety; it would
be absurd to trouble every one present with her regrets. Besides, the
harm was done--it was irreparable--and while she was turning over in her
mind in what manner she could explain to the Mother Superior that
the mistake about the hour had been no fault of hers--and the Mother
Superior, alas! would be sure to make inquiries as to the friends who