And Carl Conway cannot honestly affirm that they do. CHAPTER VII. THE STATE BALL. “I have hidden my soul out of sight and said Let none take pity upon thee. None Comfort thy crying--for lo! thou art dead. Lie still now, safe out of the sight of the sun; Have I not built thee a grave, and wrought Thy grave-clothes on thee of grievous thought?” The June sun is full of pranks to-day. There it is, scorching up the leaves in the square, broiling the toilers on the white pavements, shining down on everything with a lurid glare that makes one wink and blink, and generally uncomfortable, and now it is peering into the windows of Baby’s schoolroom, showing up the short-comings of the faded carpet, the ink stains on the old table, and streaming full on to a corner where, before her easel, Zai stands, palette and brush in hand, but idle. “Oh, it is hot! hot!” she cries impatiently, throwing down her painting apparatus and pushing her hair back from her forehead. “Here’s something to cool you!” Gabrielle says, throwing across the _Morning Post_, and then she has the good feeling to pick up a book and pretend to be buried in its contents, while Zai reads what she considers her death warrant. “A marriage has been arranged and will shortly take place between Miss Meredyth, daughter of John Meredyth, Esq., of Eaton Place, and Carlton Conway, Esq.” Three times Zai reads the announcement over--mechanically spelling each word--then she drops the paper on the floor, and going up to the open window, looks out. She does not find the sun hot now, although it is dancing on her chesnut hair, and turning each tress to fire. Her heart lies so dreadfully cold within her breast that it seems to ice her whole frame, and though her eyes face the strong yellow beams, they do not shrink from them. Since she read the words in to-day’s _Post_, she seems to be blind and deaf to everything, save the fact that Miss Meredyth has won from her that which she valued most in life. “Well, Zai?” Zai has been standing at the window perfectly motionless for half an hour, her slight figure almost rigid, her head a little thrown back, her face white as marble and almost as impassive, her two little hands clasped behind her as in a vice, and Gabrielle thinks it high time to recall her to a sense of everyday life with all its ills. “Well, Gabrielle!” The girl turns and faces her step-sister; her eyes look as if she were stunned, but her lips smile. Gabrielle stares at her for a moment, then she bends over her volume again. “There, child, don’t act with only me for an audience!” she says quietly, “You have had enough of acting and actors, goodness knows. What a brute the man has been!” “Why?” Zai asks defiantly. “Why?--because he pretended to love you, and he _knew_ you loved him, and yet he has quietly bowled you over for that doll of a thing.” “He cannot help himself, Gabrielle!” “Why cannot he help himself, pray?”