"Thank you. I hope we may meet. I am only a guest in town like yourself, but I am making a longish stay." Vanna led the way through the conservatory, walking with somewhat rapid footsteps, her eyes looking forward through the door leading into the ballroom. She had reached the centre of the floor when she was arrested by the sound of a laugh, and a light, flute-like voice breaking across the crash and clatter of the band. "Well!" cried the voice. "Have you come at last? I am waiting for you. How long must I wait?" Vanna wheeled round. Beneath the shade of a great palm tree, whose leaves swept the glass roof, stood Jean in her rose draperies, a wreath of roses crowning her dark head. "I am waiting!" she said once more, and her eyes, passing by Vanna, rested on Robert Gloucester's face. Vanna looking at him, saw his teeth clench, and his cheeks pale beneath their tan. CHAPTER FOUR. RIVAL INTERESTS. That night Vanna lay awake long after lying down, living over again the dramatic happening of the last few days. "`It's a mad world, my masters,'" she said to herself between a smile and a sigh. "No sooner do I receive a sentence of celibacy for life than I am promptly introduced to a new and interesting personality, a nice man, a superlatively nice man, a man, moreover, who shows every sign of returning the compliment and thinking me a superlatively nice girl into the bargain--when, presto! he discovers himself in the light of Jean's future husband. I know it, and she doesn't. The drollness of the situation! At this moment she is sleeping in placid innocence, while I am a-thrill at the dawning of her romance. She will marry him-- oh, yes! She will marry him; as certainly as she stood under that palm tree waiting to-night. What a lovely rose she made, and how his eyes glowed as he looked at her! Superstition or no superstition, that big, simple heart has accepted her as his wife as unquestionably as if a trumpet blast from heaven had proclaimed her name. It's such an easy thing to tumble into love with Jean; the trouble is for any masculine thing to keep steady on his feet. He will worship her, and she must love him in return, as the perfect complement of herself. He so calm, and trustful, and serene; she, airy, impulsive, rebellious; but even in her naughtiest moods so lovable and feminine a thing. Well! as I am never to have a romance of my own, I must needs find double interest in Jean's and enjoy myself vicariously through her. It will be quick work. That dramatic meeting carried him in a flash past all the initial stage of wonder and uncertainty. It's rather a pity, I should have loved to watch it grow; but it has sprung into life full-grown. Oh, Jean, Jean, how little you know--how little you guess!"