ean that I hope you will be so kind as to let me know
whether you get any further news. I shall always have a deep interest in
Gordon's welfare. Letters would reach me at Southampton, all summer.
Good-by, Mrs. Dupont, I am delighted to have had the pleasure of meeting
you. Mrs.--I mean Miss Frieda, I hope you will be so kind as to let me
see your pictures, some day. I remember now that Gordon showed me one of
them at the winter exhibition. I wanted to buy it, but somebody had
already snapped it up, of course, because it was so lovely. No, Mr.
Cole, please don't take the trouble."

She had shaken hands with my two friends and insisted on kissing the
baby, who appreciated the attention by crowing at her.

I followed her out in spite of her request.

"You must permit me to see you to the door, Miss Van Rossum," I said,
"it is the least I can do. I will surely let you know, if I hear
anything."

She nodded, very pleasantly, and went down the distressing stair-carpet
with the ease of her perfect physical training. At the door there was a
big brute of a sixty horsepower runabout and a chauffeur, who swiftly
cast aside a half-consumed cigarette and stood at attention. She stopped
on the stoop and turned to me.

"I--I don't think I know any more than when I came," she said, rather
haltingly. "There--there wasn't anything wrong, was there, Mr. Cole?"

"My dear young lady, I am proud to say that Gordon is incapable of doing
anything that would infringe the laws. But he certainly has done an evil
thing, for he has treated you very brutally, and I will never forgive
him. He has failed to appreciate--to understand. If he has discovered
that his heart--that he was incapable of giving you the strongest and
most genuine love, it is his misfortune and--I am afraid, perhaps yours,
and he did well to go away. But he should have been more considerate, he
ought to have explained things in person instead of----"

"But you must remember that I was in Florida, Mr. Cole," she
interrupted.

"Then he should have taken the first train and joined you there. A man
has no business to shirk a duty," I said indignantly.

"Oh! Mr. Cole! You must remember that Gordon isn't--isn't a man quite
like others. He has the quick and impulsive temperament of so many
artistic people."

"He always pretends to be so cool and to act only after the most mature
deliberation," I objected.

"True enough, but then, you know, that sort of thing is often rather