"That you could go quite a considerable pace, my dear girl. You'll _do_. Let me see your hands!" he demanded. And in spite of her he coolly took up a hand, examining the shapely finger-tips. He sighed. No needle had blackened or roughened them, the typewriter keys had not yet flattened them. He stepped back, looked at her from head to foot, appraising all her graces, valuing her height and roundness of figure. There was small light in his eye other than that of judicial approval. She bore out his theory. "You surprise me!" was all he said. "How do you mean, Mr. Rawn?--But you must go, you really must!" There came a knock at the door. Rawn's negative gesture was positive. After a moment's hesitation the girl stepped to the door and spoke to the maid. "You may return again in a little while, maid," she said. "I'm not quite ready now." In turn she stood with her back against the door, her own color rising. "Oh, don't be uneasy," said John Rawn smiling. "This is quite considerable of a hotel, taking it as it is. There won't be any scandal over this." "I don't think I understand you." "I'm going in just five minutes. But I want to say something to you in the way of a business proposition, Miss Delaware." "I'm sure I don't know what you mean." Her head was high, her color still rising. "Nothing in the least wrong, my dear girl," said John Rawn. "It's simply a matter of business, as I said. You're here as my assistant, of course. But did it ever occur to you that as you stand there now, and as I stand here, we might pass in that crowd below there and not be known by _any one_?" VI She still stood looking at him, her color high, undecided as to his meaning even now as he went on. "It would be rather a pleasant experience, perhaps, for you--as it would be for me--just to mingle with that giddy throng--say, for dinner. Would you like to be part of it? It's just a foolish thought that came to me." She turned to him, her eyes bright, her face eager. "Could we, Mr. Rawn?" she said. "I'm crazy over it!" "I see," he commented dryly. "You were dressing to go down to dinner?" "No, no, I couldn't afford to do that, of course. I couldn't go alone, and I had no company. I wasn't going down at all. I just dressed up--to--to--" "Just to look at yourself in the mirror, isn't that it, Miss Delaware?" "Yes, it's the truth!" She turned to him calmly at last, well in hand again. "I couldn't be one of them--couldn't be like those people down below, so I did the best I could up here--I dressed as much like them as I knew how. I--I--I _imagined_! I dreamed, Mr. Rawn. I've never known a real evening of that sort in all my life--but it's in my blood. I want to go, I want to dine, and drink, and dance--I'm mad about it, I know, but it's the truth! I want what I can't have. I want to be what I'm not. I don't know what's the reason. It's in the air--maybe it's in the day, in the country!" VII