just as Mrs. Wilder was having tea alone in
the big drawing-room, and she smiled up at him with her curious eyes,
that were the colour of granite. Without exactly knowing what her age
was, Hartley felt, somehow, that she looked younger than she was, and
that she did not do so without some aid from "boxes," but he liked her
none the less for that, and possibly admired her more. He sat down and
asked her how she was, and, as he looked at her, he wondered to think
that she had ever fainted. Clearly, she was the last woman on earth who
could be accused of Victorian ways, and to see her in her white lace
dress, dark, distinguished, and perfectly mistress of her emotions, was
to be bewildered at the memory. She treated the question with scant
ceremony, and remarked upon the fact that the night had been hot, and
that everyone had felt it.

"I've got an excellent reason for remembering the date," said Hartley
reflectively. "By the way, wasn't Absalom, old Mhtoon Pah's assistant,
once a dressing-boy or something in your establishment?"

"He was, and then he went sick, and took to this other kind of work."

"He was quite honest, I suppose?"

"Perfectly honest," said Mrs. Wilder, with a slight lift of her
eyebrows, "and a nice little boy. I hope that question doesn't mean that
you are professionally interested in his past?" she laughed carelessly.
"I am quite prepared to stand up for Absalom; he was the soul of
integrity."

Hartley put down his cup on the table.

"The boy has disappeared," he said, talking with interest, for the
subject filled his mind.

"But when, and how? I saw him quite lately."

Hartley's round, China-blue eyes fixed upon her.

"Can you tell me when you saw him?"

"One night--evening, I should say--I was out riding and I passed him
going towards the wharf, not towards the wharf exactly, but to the
houses that lie out by the end of the tram lines."

"What evening? I wish you could remember for me."

"It was the night of my own dinner-party."

"Then that was July the twenty-ninth?"

Mrs. Wilder looked at him, and bit her lip.

"Was it the twenty-ninth?" Hartley repeated the question.

"Probably it was, if you say so. I told you just now that I had Burma
head. But where has Absalom gone to?"

Hartley took up his cup again and stirred the spoon round and round.

"Forgive me for pelting you with questions, but did you see Mr. Heath
that evening?"

"Now, what _are_ you trying to get out of m