"Ambo," said Susan, putting her hand in mine, "do you know at all how terribly I've missed you?" She turned her head weakly on her pillow and looked at me. "You're older, dear. You've changed. I like your face better now than I ever did." I wrinkled my nose at her. "Is that saying much?" I grimaced. "Heaps!" She attempted to smile back at me, but her lower lip quivered. "Yours has always been my favorite face, you know, Ambo. Phil's is wiser--somehow, and stronger, too; and Jimmy's is sunnier, healthier, and--yes, handsomer, dear! Nobody could call you handsome, could they? But you're not ugly, either. Sister was adorably ugly. It was a daily miracle to see the lamp in her suddenly glow through and glorify everything. I used to wait for it. It's the only thing that has ever made me feel--humble; I never feel that way with you. I just feel satisfied, content." "Like putting on an old pair of slippers," I ventured. "That's it," sighed Susan happily, and closed her eyes. "That's it!" echoed my familiar demon, "but no one but Susan would have admitted it." As usual, I found it wiser to cut him dead. "Well, dear," I said to Susan, "there's one good thing: you'll be able to use the old pair of slippers any time you need them now. I'm to be held in Paris, I find, for a three-months' job." She opened her eyes again; disapprovingly, I felt. "You shouldn't have done that, Ambo! You're needed at Evian; I know you are. It's bad enough to be out of things myself, but I won't drag you out of them! How could you imagine that would please me?" "I hoped it would, a little," I replied, "but it hasn't any of it been my doing--Chatworth's wife's expecting a baby in a few weeks, and he wants to run home to welcome it; I'm to take on his executive work till he gets back. God knows he needs a rest!" "As if you didn't, too!" protested Susan, inconsistently enough. Her eyes fell shut again; her hands slipped from mine. "Ambo," she asked presently, in a thread of voice that I had to lean down to her to hear, "have they told you I can never have a baby now?... Wasn't it lucky if that had to happen to some woman--it happened to me?" No, they had not told me; and for the moment I could not answer her. "Jimmy's wife is going to have a baby soon," added Susan. "Jimmy's--_what_!" I shrieked. Yes, shrieked--for, to my horror, I heard my voice crack and soar, strident, incredulous. Susan was staring at me, wide-eyed, her face aquiver with excitement; two deep spots of color flaming on her thin cheeks. "Didn't you _know_?" The white door opened as she spoke, and Susan's Norman nurse hurried in, her sparrow eyes transformed to stiletto points of indignation. "_Ah, m'sieu--c'est trop fort!_ When I told you expressly to do nothing to excite the poor little one!" I rose, self-convicted, before her.