y harm anyhow," Allerton assured her.
"I'll just finish this, and then I'll look for the poem by Mrs.
Deland."

With her veil and gloves in her lap Letty sat thoughtful while he
passed from shelf to shelf in search of the smaller volume. Of her
real suspicion, that the man was a friend of Judson Flack's, she
decided not to speak.

Seated once more in front of her, and bending slightly toward her,
Allerton read:

"Oh, not in ladies' gardens,
My peasant posy!
Smile thy dear blue eyes,
Nor only--nearer to the skies--
In upland pastures, dim and sweet--
But by the dusty road
Where tired feet
Toil to and fro;
Where flaunting Sin
May see thy heavenly hue,
Or weary Sorrow look from thee
Toward a more tender blue."

Allerton glanced up from the book. "Pretty, isn't it?"

She admitted that it was, and then added: "And yet there was the times
when the castin' director put me right in the front, to register what
the crowd behind me was thinkin' about. He might ha' noticed me
then."

"Yes, of course; that must have been it. Now wouldn't you like me to
read that again? You must always read a poem a second or third time to
really know what it's about."

* * * * *

Meanwhile a poem of another sort was being read to Miss Barbara
Walbrook by her aunt, who had entered the drawing-room within five
minutes after Allerton had left it. During those five minutes Barbara
had remained seated, plunged into reverie. The problem with which she
had to deal was the degree to which she was right or wrong in
permitting Rashleigh to go on in his crazy course. That this outcast
girl was twining herself round his heart was a fact growing too
obtrusive to be ignored. Had Rashleigh been as other men decisive
action would have been imperative. But he was not as other men, and
there lay the possibilities she found difficult.

If the aunt couldn't help the niece to solve the difficult question
she at least could compel her to take a stand.

As she entered the drawing-room she came from out of doors, a slender,
unfleshly figure, all intellect and idea. Her vices being wholly of
the spirit were not recognized as vices, so that she passed as the
highest type of the good woman which the continent of Amer