"Far from it," said Mona drily. "I was engaged on the most prosaic work it is possible to conceive, filling in the schedule for my Intermediate. It seems to me that I have spent the greater part of my life filling in the schedule for my Intermediate. If I fail again I shall employ an amanuensis for the sole purpose. Come and help me. Full Christian name and surname?" "Mona Margaret Maclean." "Oh, drop the Margaret! I am prepared to take the chance of there being another Mona Maclean. Age, last birthday?" "Ninety-nine." "No doubt I shall fill that into an Intermediate schedule some day, but not yet awhile. I wonder if they will have reformed the Practical Chemistry by that time? Or will the dear old M.B. Lond. have lost its _cachet_ altogether? It is warm to-day, is it not?" "Frightfully! I met Miss Lascelles just now, and she informed me, in her bell-like voice, that if we were quite civilised we should go about without any clothes at all just now. I told her I hoped the relics of barbarism would last out my time." "Then I presume Miss Lascelles will not throw her pearls before swine again. Are you going to hospital?" "Not to-day. Hospital is unbearable in this weather. The air is thick with microbes." Mona looked at her friend reflectively. "Suppose you come down to Richmond with me," she said, "and blow away a few of the microbes on the river?" "Oh, Mona, how lovely! But can you spare the time?" "Yes, I began early to-day. But we will have some lunch first. In the meantime I will sing you my last song, and you shall criticise." "Are you still going on with your singing lessons? I can't think how you find time for it." "I think it saves time in the end. It is a grand safety-valve; and besides--a woman is robbed of half her armour if she cannot use her voice." Her hands ran lightly up and down the keys of the piano, and she began to sing Schubert's _Ave Maria_. "Miss Dalrymple says that is my _chef-d'œuvre_," she said, when she had finished. "What think you?" But Lucy made no answer. "Mona," she said a minute later, "do you think it is worth while to go on the river, after all? It is rather a fag, and why should we?" Her voice was husky, and suggestive of infinite weariness. Mona rose from the piano, and deliberately, almost brutally, took the girl's face between her hands, and turned it to the light. She was not mistaken. The pretty eyes were dim with tears. "Lucy," she said, "you and I have pretended long enough. What is the use of friendship, if we never fall back upon it in time of need? I want you to tell me what it was that spoilt your visit to Cannes." "Nothing," said Lucy, with burning face, "unless, perhaps, my own idiocy. Oh, Mona, you dear old bully, there is not anything to tell! I thought I was always going to get the best of it with men, and now a man has got the best of it with me. It's only fair. Now you know the whole story. Despise me as much as you like."