At the sound of an approaching step—was it an hour or a day she had kept her post?—she started nervously. Through the slightly parted curtains she watched the stair-turn anxiously. That long, dangling, masculine figure was at least not Mrs. Budd. She sighed relief. It was Thair. He came on with his elegant slouch, turning down the hall toward the window embrasure, stopped a moment on the threshold of the morning-room, looking in with a questing turn of his long neck, strolled on, craning at the alcove curtains. Florence thrust them back. Evidently it was not she he was looking for. He was surprised, and something more, hardly curious, but a look that harked back to what had been revealed him on the terrace. “I am,” he explained to her, “in search of the young madam.” He added with a considerative smile, “Our last ride together—if _she_ has anything to say about it.” Her face showed an odd mingling of distress and relief. “But you will have to wait. She can’t be disturbed now.” “Well”—he dawdled over it a minute—“but she _will_ be disturbed. _I’ll_ wait, of course; but will—Mrs. Budd?” He brought it out with the faintest embarrassment. Florence looked at him, considering. “It’s just what she never _will_ do,” he said. “She’ll expect to see us off.” Her answer was the dismayed sound that escaped her lips. She put her hand out with a gesture that warned him back. They were like a small secret conclave, shut in their alcove behind the curtains, stilled in the middle of their plots. A door down the hall had softly closed. They saw Julia stand for a moment outside the door of Longacre’s room. Then she turned and came slowly along the hall. She was coming down upon them, and with every step she overwhelmed them more. Such a strange Julia, so pale, so unimperious, with all her sparkle stilled! Yet she shone! Her great dilated eyes, her face, dawning on them, glimmering by, looked aghast with happiness. Florence was trembling. Her eyes were on the narrow slit between the curtains where that vision of Julia had passed. She could not speak immediately when she finally turned to Thair. He was looking at her with the oddest possible expression. “Well, it doesn’t matter about Mrs. Budd _now_,” he said. His usually smooth voice sounded uneven. “She’s done for!” At this the lines in her forehead grew deep. “If one could only make it easier for her! It is _dreadful_! But—didn’t you see, just now?—it was the only thing to do!” “Dear girl,” he earnestly assured her, “that you think so is enough for me! But you can’t show it to _her_, poor lady!” She looked at him with a sudden flash. “_You_ could make it easier.” [Illustration: “_Such a strange Julia!_”] “I?” He was blank. “If she thought—if she knew that some other hope she may have had for Julia—was—couldn’t you make her know?” At this he fixed her with his old diabolical glint. “You mean I could congratulate her—heartily?” Her answering smile was wan. She left it to him.