emale arrows,
they quite naturally looked with dismay upon an almost beautiful and
_quite_ penniless and homeless girl about whom, _after_ having read the
will they referred to as "poor Jill, for whom I _suppose_ we _must_ do
_something_ don't you know?" with a quavering inflection at the end of
the phrase.

But Jill did not stop on refusing the eligible owner of an unmortgaged
estate. No! she set out to look for work off her own bat, and actually
found it in that occupation which, far less paid than more, opens up a
perfect vista of possible adventures under the guise of a travelling
companion.

She spoke French, German, and Italian like natives, which was all to
the good. She danced like a Vernon Castle, knew almost as much about
fencing as a Saviolo, shot like a George V., and rode like a cowboy,
all of which qualifications she erased from her list on the termination
of the freezing half-hour of her first interview with her first
would-be employer, who, until the enumeration of the above sporting
qualifications, had seemed desirous of taking her along with a
bronchitic pug to winter in Bath.

Since then she had done Europe and Africa pretty well with never the
suspicion of an adventure, and, when you meet her on the station of
Ismailiah, where you change for Port Said, she was returning from
Australia, with a wardrobe at last beginning to fret about the hem, and
shine around the seams, a condition accounted for by the emaciated
condition of her purse; a memory of good things and hours worn thin by
the constant nerve-wracking routine of capsules, hot drinks, hot water
bottles, moods and shawls; and a fully developed rebellion in her whole
being against the never-ending vista which stretched far into the
future, of other such hours, days, months, yea! even years!

But everything was capped by a still more fully developed decision to
brave it out, and out, and out, rather than return to ask the help of
those whose hand-clasp had weakened in ratio to the dwindling of the
gold in her coffers.

CHAPTER III

And why did she stand by herself?

This is no riddle, the answer being too easy. Men would have answered,
"Guessed in once, she was pretty!" And the women would guess in once
too, but would keep silent, the pretty ones merely smiling, having
sampled the Coventry-sending powers of plain women in the majority on
board, and the plain ones from that unwillingness inborn or inherited
in every woman to adm