y mind. I felt
ungenerous, but I would not lie to him.

"I am a queer fellow, Vere," I said. "Leave that to time, as you say! As
for the plans, they are far beyond my scope. A city man, it has been my
way to 'phone for an expert when anything was to be done, or to buy what
I fancied and pay the bills. In this case, you are the expert. The plans
seem brilliant to me. Certainly they are moderate in cost. Keep them,
and carry them out as soon as that may be done. You are master here, not
I."

We walked back together through the sun and freshness of the early
spring morning. As we neared the house Phillida's voice hailed us. She
was at my window again, leaning out with her hair wind-ruffled about her
face.

"Cousin Roger," she summoned me, "I have found out what makes your room
as sweet as a garden of spices. See what it is to be a composer
completely surrounded by royalties, able to buy the most gorgeous scents
to lay on one's pillow! And all enclosed in antique gold!"

She held up some small object that shone in the sunlight. "Throw it
down," I begged, startled into excitement.

She complied, laughing. Vere sprang forward, but I made a quicker step
and caught the thing.

It was one of those filigree balls of gold wrought into openwork, about
the size of a walnut, that fine ladies used to wear swung from a chain
or ribbon and call a pomander. The toy held a chosen perfume or essence
supposed to be reviving in case miladi felt a swoon or megrim about to
overwhelm her; as ladies did in past centuries and do no longer.

Whose gentle pity had brought this pomander to my pillow, to help me
from that faintness which had followed my struggle with the Thing? Whose
was the exquisite, individual fragrance contained in the ball I held? I
had a vision of a figure, surely light and soft of movement, haloed with
such matchless hair as the braid I had captured, stealing step by timid
step across my room; within my reach while I lay inert. Perhaps her face
had bent near mine in her doubt of my life or death; hidden eyes had
studied me in the scanty starlight.

Oh, for Ethan Vere's good looks and athlete's grace, to lure my lady
from her masquerade!

"Where did you buy it, Cousin Roger? 'Fess up!" Phillida's merry voice
coaxed me.

"It was given to me," I slowly answered. "I cannot offer it to you,
Phil. But I will buy any other pretty thing you fancy, instead, next
time I go to town."

She made a gesture of disclaim.

"I