raught occasioned by the opening of the door caused the
smoke from the incense-burner to be wafted toward the centre of the
room. Like a blue-gray phantom it coiled about the two standing there
upon a red and gold Bedouin rug, and the heavy perfume, or the close
proximity of this singularly lovely woman, wrought upon the high-strung
sensibilities of Deacon to such an extent that he was conscious of a
growing faintness.

"Ah! You are not well!" exclaimed Madame with deep concern. "It is the
perfume which that foolish Ah Li has lighted. He forgets that we are in
England."

"Not at all," protested Deacon faintly, and conscious that he was making
a fool of himself. "I think I have perhaps been overdoing it rather of
late. Forgive me if I sit down."

He sank on the cushioned divan, his heart beating furiously, while
Madame touched the little bell, whereupon one of the servants entered.

She spoke in Chinese, pointing to the incense-burner.

Ah Li bowed and removed the censer. As the door softly reclosed:

"You are better?" she whispered, sweetly solicitous, and, seating
herself beside Deacon, she laid her hand lightly upon his arm.

"Quite," he replied hoarsely; "please do not worry about me. I am
wondering what has become of Annesley."

"Ah, the poor man!" exclaimed Madame, with a silver laugh, and began to
busy herself with the teacups. "He remembered, as he was looking at my
new Leonardo, an appointment which he had quite forgotten."

"I can understand his forgetting anything under the circumstances."

Madame de Medici raised a tiny cup and bent slightly toward him. He
felt that he was losing control of himself, and, averting his eyes, he
stooped and smelled the orchid in his buttonhole. Then, accepting the
cup, he was about to utter some light commonplace when the faintness
returned overwhelmingly, and, hurriedly replacing the cup upon the
tray, he fell back among the cushions. The stifling perfume of the place
seemed to be choking him.

"Ah, poor boy! You are really not at all well. How sorry I am!"

The sweet tones reached him as from a great distance; but as one dying
in the desert turns his face toward the distant oasis, Deacon turned
weakly to the speaker. She placed one fair arm behind his head,
pillowing him, and with a peacock fan which had lain amid the cushions
fanned his face. The strange scene became wholly unreal to him; he
thought himself some dying barbaric chief.

"Rest there," murmured the