It would be rather pleasant. There was a little place at Meudon, she remembered. The plane trees would just be in full leaf. “Why must you preach?” she asked. “It doesn’t seem to pay you.” There was a curious smile about the girl’s lips as she caught Joan’s eye.!

It was some time before she fell asleep. The high glass faced her as she lay in bed. She could not get away from the idea that it was her mother’s face that every now and then she saw reflected there. She had not told him of the Phillips episode. But she felt instinctively that he knew. It was always a little mysterious to her, his perception in matters pertaining to herself.

She met Carleton by chance a day or two later, as she was entering the office. “I want to see you,” he said; and took her up with him into his room. So he, too, had thought to build Jerusalem. She did effect an improvement in the poor lady’s dress. On Madge’s advice she took her to a voluble little woman in the Earl’s Court Road who was struck at once by Madame Phillips’s remarkable resemblance to the Baroness von Stein. Had not Joan noticed it? Whatever suited the Baroness von Stein—allowed by common consent to be one of the best-dressed women in London—was bound to show up Madame Phillips to equal advantage. By curious coincidence a costume for the Baroness had been put in hand only the day before. It was sent for and pinned upon the delighted Madame Phillips. Perfection! As the Baroness herself would always say: “My frock must be a framework for my personality. It must never obtrude.” The supremely well-dressed woman! One never notices what she has on: that is the test. It seemed it was what Mrs. Phillips had always felt herself. Joan could have kissed the voluble, emphatic little woman.