has been withdrawn?"

"Yes. The rights, you know, really belong to Mr. Bradley; and he can't
endure his part."

"Is there no one else to--"

"He objects to anyone else. We generally play together." This was
inadvertent, but Stephen had no reason to imagine that she contracted
her eyebrows in any special irritation. "It is an atrocious piece," she
added.

"Is it?" he said, absently, and then, "Yes, it is an atrocious piece.
But I am glad, too, that I saw you." He looked away from her, reddening
deeply, and stood up. His bands fell upon him again, he bade her a
measured and precise farewell. It seemed as if he hurried. She only half
rose to give him her unwounded hand, and when he was gone she sank back
again thoughtfully.

CHAPTER VIII.

"I have outstayed all the rest," Lindsay said, with his hat and stick in
his hand, in Alicia Livingstone's drawing-room, "because I want
particularly to talk to you. They have left me precious little time," he
added, glancing at his watch.

She had wondered when he came early in the formal Sunday noon hour for
men's calls, since he had more casual privileges; and wondered more when
he sat on with composure, as one who is master of the situation, while
Major-Generals and Deputy Secretaries came and went. There was a mist in
her brain as she talked to the Major-Generals and Deputy Secretaries--it
did not in the least obscure what she found to say--and in the midst of
it the formless idea that he must wish to attach a special importance to
his visit. This took shape and line when they were alone, and he spoke
of outsitting the others. It impelled her to walk to the window and open
it. "You might stay to lunch," she said, addressing a pair of crows in
altercation on the verandah.

"There is nearly half-an-hour before lunch," he said. "Can I convince
you, in that time, I wonder, that I am not an absolute fool."

Alicia turned and came back to her sofa. She may have had a prevision of
the need of support. "I hardly think," she said, drawing the long breath
with which we try to subdue a tempest within, "that it would take so
long." She tried to look at him, but her eyes would not carry above the
violets in his button-hole.

"I've had a supreme experience," he said, "very strange and very lovely.
I am living in it, moving in it, speaking in it," he added quickly,
watching her face; "so don't, for God's sake, touch it roughly."

She lifted her hand in nervous, involuntary d