g effect.'"

"I hope not," I exclaimed apprehensively. "Whose is this?"

"Archie's."

"May I see a bit--?"

"Not a bit," said Dolly. "Archie's is--is rather foolish, Mr. Carter."

"So I suppose," said I.

"Dear boy!" said Dolly reflectively.

"I hate sentiment," said I. "Here's a long one. Who wrote--?"

"Oh, you mustn't look at that--not at that, above all!"

"Why above all?" I asked with some severity.

Dolly smiled; then she observed in a soothing tone.

"Perhaps it won't be 'above all' when you've written yours, Mr. Carter."

"By the way," I said carelessly, "I suppose Archie sees all of them?"

"He has never asked to see them," answered Lady Mickleham.

The reply seemed satisfactory; of course, Archie had only to ask. I took
a clean quill and prepared to write.

"You promise to be sincere, you know," Dolly reminded me.

I laid down my pen.

"Impossible!" said I firmly.

"O, but why, Mr. Carter?"

"There would be an end of our friendship."

"Do you think as badly of me as all that?" asked Dolly with a rueful
air.

I leant back in my chair, and looked at Dolly. She looked at me. She
smiled. I may have smiled.

"Yes," said I.

"Then you needn't write it quite all down," said Dolly.

"I am obliged," said I, taking up my pen.

"You mustn't say what isn't true, but you needn't say everything that
is--that might be--true," explained Dolly.

This, again, seemed satisfactory. I began to write, Dolly sitting
opposite me with her elbows on the table, and watching me.

After ten minutes' steady work, which included several pauses for
reflection, I threw down the pen, leant back in my chair, and lit a
cigarette.

"Now read it," said Dolly, her chin in her hands and her eyes fixed on
me.

"It is, on the whole," I observed, "complimentary."

"No, really," said Dolly. "Yet you promised to be sincere."

"You would not have had me disagreeable?" I asked.

"That's a different thing," said Dolly. "Read it, please."

"Lady Mickleham," I read, "is usually accounted a person of considerable
attractions. She is widely popular, and more than one woman has been
known to like her."

"I don't quite understand that," interrupted Dolly.

"It is surely simple," said I; and I read on without delay. "She is
kind even to her husband, and takes the utmost pains to conceal from her
mother-in-law anything calculated to distress that lady."

"I suppose you mean that to be nice?" said Dolly.

"Of course,"