no matter who it was. I, too, felt relieved by the
interruption. In my state of wildly conflicting emotions any third
person would be a relief.

"The door opened, and Miss Sarah Castle walked in. 'Oh, Mary,' she
exclaimed, 'I am so glad to find you at home! As it isn't late and the
moon is so bright, I thought I would run over to see you for a few
minutes. Oh, Mr. Howard!'

"Sarah Castle was a young woman for whom I had no fancy. Active in mind
and body, and apparently constructed of thoroughly well-seasoned
material, she was quick to notice, eager to know, and ready at all times
to display an interest in the affairs of her friends, with which, in
most cases, said friends would willingly have dispensed. As she took a
seat she exclaimed:

"'You don't mean to say, Mary, that you went deaf in Burma?'

"Unfortunately I had forgotten to put my translatophone into my pocket,
and it was lying in full view on the table. Mary gave a scornful glance
toward the innocent tube.

"'Oh, that?' she said. 'That is not mine. It belongs to Mr. Howard.'

"The words 'Mr. Howard' grated upon my nerves. Up to this moment, except
through the translatophone, she had not addressed me by my name in any
form; and every tentative lover knows that when his lady addresses him
as though he had no name it means that she does not wish to use his
formal title and that the time has not arrived for her to call him by
his Christian name.

"'You deaf?' cried Sarah, turning to me. 'I have never heard anything of
that. When did it come on? It must have been very recent.'

"'Oh, he isn't deaf,' said Mary, impatiently. 'It is only one of his
inventions. But tell me something of your brothers. I have not heard a
word about them yet.'

"But the knowledge-loving Sarah was not to be bluffed off in this way.

"'Oh, they are all right,' said she. 'They are both in college now. But
Mr. Howard deaf! I am truly amazed. Do you have to talk to him through
this, Mary?'

"Mary Armat was not an ill-natured girl, but, as I said before, she was
a high-spirited one, and was at the time in a state of justifiable
irritation.

"'Oh, bother that thing!' she answered. 'I told you it is only one of
his inventions, and I wish he would put it in his pocket.'

"'Not just yet,' said Sarah. 'I am really anxious to know about it. Why
do you use it, Mr. Howard, if you are not deaf?'

"My face must have displayed my extreme embarrassment at this
unanswerable question, for Ma