The young unmarried set that danced at the Club or in the larger of the home parlours every night would have monopolised the central hall of the bungalow on Saturdays as well had it not been for the sweet but firm resistance of Mrs. Balfame. Lacking in a proper sex vanity she might be, but she was far too proud and just to permit her own generation to be obliterated by mere youth. Having no children of her own, it shocked her fine sense of the fitness of things to watch the subservience of parents and the selfishness of offspring. One of the most notable results of her quiet determination was that she and her friends enjoyed every privilege of the Country Club when the mood was on them, and that a goodly number of the men of their own generation did not confine their attentions exclusively to the bar, but came out and danced with their neighbours' wives. The young people sniffed, but as Mrs. Balfame had founded the Country Club, and they were all helpless under her inflexible will and skilful manipulation, they never dreamed of rebellion. During the fortnight Mrs. Balfame had cunningly replaced the vial, the indifferent Cassie leaving the sitting-room at her disposal while she wrote a note reminding Dr. Anna of the promised list of war books, adding playfully that she had no time to waste in a busy doctor's waiting-room. In truth Dr. Anna was a difficult person to see at this time. There was an epidemic of typhoid in the county, and much illness among children. However, on the third Saturday after the interrupted supper, as Mrs. Balfame was motoring out to the Club with her friend, Mrs. Battle, wife of the President of the Bank of Elsinore, she saw Dr. Anna driving her little runabout down a branching road. With a graceful excuse she deserted her hostess, sprang into the humbler machine, and gaily ordered her friend to turn and drive to the Club. "You take a rest this afternoon," she said peremptorily. "Otherwise you will be a wreck when your patients need you most. You look just about fagged out. And I want a little of your society. I've been thinking of taking to a sick bed to get it." Dr. Anna looked at her brilliant friend with an expression of dumb gratitude and adoration. She was worth one hundred per cent. more than this companion of her forty years, but she never would know it. She regarded Enid Balfame as one of the superwomen of Earth, astray in the little world of Elsinore. Even when Mrs. Balfame had done her own work she had managed to look rare and lovely. Her hair was neatly arranged for the day before descent to the lower regions, and her pretty print frock was half covered by a white apron as immaculate as her round uncovered arms.