rrow hands between his; "--you
adorable child, you wonderful girl----"

"Oh, I'm so glad, Jim! Shall we have tea?... You dear fellow! I'm so
very happy that you came! Wait a moment--" she leaned wide from him
and touched an electric bell. "Now you'll have to behave properly,"
she said with delightful malice.

He released her; she spoke to the maid and then went over with him to
the sofa, flinging muff, stole and purse on a chair.

"Pure premonition," she explained, stripping the gloves from her
hands. "Ilse and Marya were all for the Plaza, but something sent me
homeward! Isn't it really very strange, Jim? Why, I almost had an
inclination to run when I turned into our street--not even knowing
why, of course----"

"You're so sweet and generous!" he blurted out. "Why don't you raise
hell with me?"

"You know," she said demurely, "I don't raise hell, dear."

"But I've behaved so rottenly----"

"It really wasn't friendly to neglect me so entirely."

He looked down--laid one hand on hers in silence.

"I understand, Jim," she said sweetly. "Is it all right now?"

"It's all right.... Of course I haven't changed."

"Oh."

"But it's all right."

"Really?"

"Yes.... What is there for me to do but to accept things as they
are?"

"You mean, 'accept _me_ as I am!' Oh, Jim, it's so dear of you. And
you know well enough that I care for no other man as I do for
you----"

The waitress with the tea-tray cut short that sort of conversation.
Palla's appetite was a healthy one. She unpinned her hat and flung it
on the piano. Then she nestled down sideways on the sofa, one leg
tucked under the other knee, her hair in enough disorder to worry any
other girl--and began to tuck away tea and cakes. Sometimes, in
animated conversation, she gesticulated with a buttered bun--once she
waved her cup to emphasise her point:

"The main idea, of course, is to teach the eternal law of Love and
Service," she explained. "But, Jim, I have become recently, and in a
measure, militant."

"You're going to love the unwashed with a club?"

"You very impudent boy! We're going to combat this new and terrible
menace--this sinister flood that threatens the world--the crimson tide
of anarchy!"

"Good work, darling! I enlist for a machine gun uni----"

"Listen! The battle is to be entirely verbal. Our Combat Club No. 1,
the first to be established--is open to anybody and everybody. All are
at liberty to enter into the discussions. We who b