MY DEAR MR. MANN:--Such a pity that we are not to have our fun, after all. Yet, perhaps it is just as well. I should be very speedily without my light, and the cry of “senza moccolo, senza moccola,” must be very dispiriting. Have a good time right along. Good-bye--good-bye. Of course, if Mae had not been beside herself with conflicting emotions, she would never have sent this note, or repeated the good-bye in that echoing, departing sort of way. Norman Mann knit his brow as he read it. “What is the row now?” he thought. “What a child it is, anyway. She has had the mocoletti fun in her mind since we left America, and now she throws it away. Well, there’s no help for it; I’m booked for Miss Rae. I’ll get Eric to see if Mae’s really ill. I wonder if she’s afraid of me, because she cried last night, afraid I took that big tear for more than it was worth. “Mae,” said Eric, entering her room an hour later, “Norman feels dreadfully that you are not able to go to-night, and so do I. I suppose those wretched marbles did it this morning. Couldn’t you possibly come?” “No,” replied Mae, rising on her elbow, “but sit down a moment, Eric.” “How pretty you look,” said her brother, seating himself by her side. Mae’s hair was tumbled in brown waves that looked as if they couldn’t quite make up their minds to curl, much as they wanted to; her eyes shone strangely; and the little scarlet shawl that she had drawn over her head and shoulders was no brighter than her flushed cheeks. She smiled at her brother, but said hurriedly; “Tell me of your plans for to-night. I suppose you and Mr. Mann are going with your new friends.” “Yes, Norman will go with me and the girls, but he does it with a bad enough grace. He’s dreadfully tired of Miss Rae; and, to tell you the truth, Mae, she is rather namby-pamby--very different from Miss Hopkins, and then, besides, he had so set his heart on going with you to-night.” “O, yes,” said Mae, scornfully, and bit her lips. “Why, Mae, what is the matter with you? You seem to doubt every one and everything. You know Norman is truth itself.” “Is he?” asked Mae, indifferently. “I’ve seen for a long time,” continued Eric, “that you two were not the friends you once were, but I don’t understand this open dislike. Doesn’t it spoil your pleasure? You don’t seem to have the real old-fashioned good times, my little girl,” and Eric pulled his clumsy dear hand through a twist of the brown hair caressingly.