"I've just finished a life-size statue of a child," Jack said. "It's only in clay at present, but I am going to work it out in marble--perhaps as a memorial-stone. You think it is good, don't you, Geoff?" and he turned anxiously towards his friend for confirmation. "Indeed it is splendid," was the ready answer "You should see it, Winborough. It is in the plaster-room yonder. It is a dreadful weight to lift. Will you go in there and look at it?" Winborough cordially assented, and escorted by Jack and Pallister he left the studio. Geoff did not accompany the trio. He was anxious about Evarne, and, sitting down beside her, he slipped his arm around her waist as he declared in a tone of raillery-- "Well, sweetheart, you have surprised me! I had no idea you were such a little coward. I thought you were as brave as anything." She hastened to account for this sudden weakness by numerous excuses. It seemed to her that it must necessarily have aroused some suspicion, although Geoff's manner showed not the slightest trace of any such feeling. "I don't like you to think me cowardly," she said, "so please remember all I have had lately to upset me. First of all, I have not really been feeling fit to pose lately. I'm weary! The engagement I finished on Thursday was a terribly trying one. I stood for that wretched artist for the figure for nearly six weeks without missing a single day except Sundays. He wanted to get his picture done before he went away for his holidays, and he succeeded, but it made me quite ill." Geoff was properly indignant. "It was enough to kill you; you should not consent to do such things. You must not play with your health like that. You ought never to have sat at all for such a selfish brute." Evarne shrugged her shoulders. "You see, you don't know what it is to have to earn your own living," she declared with a little smile. "I certainly did intend resting for the remainder of the week, but you were so anxious to start your picture, dear, that I went right on without even a day's interval." Now Geoff was indeed repentant. "Oh, my darling, I didn't understand! I didn't know! It's all my fault. How horribly thoughtless I am! Why didn't you tell me?" "I didn't think it would matter. I am very strong, you know, as a rule. But what I learnt this morning so suddenly worried me seriously; and then--I told you--I got so frightened when your cousin was really here, that my silly hands trembled, and I broke that vase that I know you value. So altogether, if I was a bit pale and not quite myself, it wasn't without sufficient cause, was it?"