“And suppose she repeats her mother’s experience,” suggested Joan. “Yes,” he answered. “I have always loved you.”!

Beyond giving up her visits to the house, she had made no attempt to avoid meeting Phillips; and at public functions and at mutual friends they sometimes found themselves near to one another. It surprised her that she could see him, talk to him, and even be alone with him without its troubling her. He seemed to belong to a part of her that lay dead and buried—something belonging to her that she had thrust away with her own hands: that she knew would never come back to her. “I took one or two prizes myself,” said Mrs. Phillips. “But, of course, one forgets things. I was wondering if you would mind if I ran up occasionally to ask you a question. Of course, as you know, my ’usband ’as ’ad so few advantages”—the lady’s mind was concerned with more important matters, and the aspirates, on this occasion, got themselves neglected—“It is wonderful what he ’as done without them. But if, now and then, I could ’elp him—”

Miss Greyson left them. She had to finish an article. They debated “Clorinda’s” views; and agreed that, as a practical housekeeper, she would welcome attention being given to the question of the nation’s food. The Evening Gazette would support Phillips in principle, while reserving to itself the right of criticism when it came to details. “Didn’t you love him?” asked the girl, staring. “Wouldn’t you have helped him?” Joan had promised to go down on the Friday; but finding, on the Thursday morning, that it would be difficult, decided to run down that afternoon instead. She thought at first of sending a wire. But in Mrs. Phillips’s state of health, telegrams were perhaps to be avoided. It could make no difference. The front door of the little house was standing half open. She called down the kitchen stairs to the landlady, but received no answer. The woman had probably run out on some short errand. She went up the stairs softly. The bedroom door, she knew, would be open. Mrs. Phillips had a feeling against being “shut off,” as she called it. She meant to tap lightly and walk straight in, as usual. But what she saw through the opening caused her to pause. Mrs. Phillips was sitting up in bed with her box of cosmetics in front of her. She was sensitive of anyone seeing her make-up; and Joan, knowing this, drew back a step. But for some reason, she couldn’t help watching. Mrs. Phillips dipped a brush into one of the compartments and then remained with it in her hand, as if hesitating. Suddenly she stuck out her tongue and passed the brush over it. At least, so it seemed to Joan. It was only a side view of Mrs. Phillips’s face that she was obtaining, and she may have been mistaken. It might have been the lips. The woman gave a little gasp and sat still for a moment. Then, putting away the brush, she closed the box and slipped it under the pillow.