teel. Ruth marvelled.

"How strong you are!" she cried; "and yet you are slight. You are not as
big as I am, but oh, how much stronger you are!"

"I have a perfect figure," said Olga calmly. "It is worth preserving. No
one admires my body so much as I do myself. I must not get fat. When you
are a fat old woman, I shall still be as I am now. You will diet, and
pray, and rave,--because you are growing old,--and I shall do none of
these things. I eat like a pig, I never pray, and I do not believe in
growing old. But you do not come to see me about myself, Miss Clinton.
You find me sitting idly with my legs crossed, and you are surprise.
I work as I dance,--very, oh, so very hard while I am at ze task,--but
with frequent periods of rest. So I do not wear out myself too soon.
It is the only way. Work for an hour, rest for ten minutes,--relax and
forget,--and you will see how well it goes. Why do you come? Is it to
talk about the baby?"

"Yes, it is, Madame Obosky. I have come to ask you to use your influence
with Mr. Percival. You--"

"But I have no influence with Mr. Percivail," interrupted the other,
staring.

Ruth flushed. "You are his friend. You--"

"Ah, yes,--but nothing more than zat. You too are his friend, Miss
Clinton."

"I see little or nothing of Mr. Percival," said Ruth stiffly. "We are
not friends,--not really friends."

"But you admire him, eh? Quite as much as I admire him,--and as every
one else does."

"There are certain things about him that I admire, of course."

"You admire him for the same reason that I admire him. Because he has
a most charming and agreeable way of telling me to go to the devil. Is
that not so?"

"Madame Obosky!"

"It comes to the same thing. If you would like me to put it in another
form, he has a very courteous way of resisting. He is most aggravating,
Miss Clinton. He is most disappointing. He should be like soft clay in
our hands, and he isn't. Is that not so?"

"Is it not possible, Madame Obosky, that we,--you and I,--may have an
entirely different viewpoint so far as Mr. Percival is concerned? Or any
other man, for that matter?" Ruth spoke coldly, almost insultingly.

"I dare say," agreed Olga, composedly, not in the least offended by the
implication. "You want to marry him. I do not."

"How dare you say that? I do not want to marry that man. I do not want
to marry him, I say."

"How interesting. You surprise me, Miss Clinton. It appears, then, that
our view