“I’m awfully glad to see you,” he told Thurley. “Hobart said you would be here—so I came.” He avoided Lissa’s eyes. “He said I must bring you home because he does not like stray cab drivers and he says you’ve no car of your own. I say, Lissa, I’ve got the coast engagement and if I have my company ready by the first of April, we’ll be on our way.” Lissa mumbled a response. Mark was looking at Thurley’s half flushed cheeks and startled eyes, the prim white gown cut high in the neck—a contrast to Lissa’s sumptuous red velvet which revealed a fifth vertebra! “Oh, do take me home. I’ve heard such a world of new things and eaten such a goody shop that I’ll have hard work to be of any use to-morrow!” It was a relief to have Mark appear; there was a hint of the boy Dan in his manner and his handsome self hovering about her. She looked at Lissa and enjoyed her discomfiture, wondering if when she had dissected her theories she would still believe in them or if there were not something of the sorceress about Lissa with her purring voice and velvet-like hands. Then, realizing that Mark was one of Lissa’s “pet robins,” as she named him, that he—all the old-time horror which the Corners had bestowed upon its “nice” girls rushed over her and she grew monosyllabic and preoccupied as she made ready to accept his escort. Lissa kissed her good-night and added, “Drop in on your way home, Mark, I’ve something to tell you.” “Oh, you want to see me to-night?” His voice was rather lack-lustre. As the cab rolled off in the night, Lissa standing at the glass doors, a striking figure in her crimson gown, Mark said anxiously, “What did you talk about? Lissa’s such a rattlebox when she has had absinthe!” Thurley answered coldly, “Art,” after which Mark tried to explain his coming tour but it brought no response from Thurley. She was trying to decide three things all at once. Did she or did she not believe Lissa’s theories? Should she have a contempt for Mark who evidently did coincide with them or should she, womanlike, flirt with him since he seemed most willing? Lastly, where did Bliss Hobart go to of a summer? Perhaps green lights showed in Thurley’s eyes as well. But she would have been still more disillusioned had she seen Mark an hour later returning to the Hotel Particular and finding an enraged, ugly woman, harsh-voiced, red-faced, clad in a pink chiffon negligee with hideous flounces. “You needn’t think she’ll look at you,” she began accusingly, pounding her heavy fists on the table. “She is Hobart’s prize and he is no saint, even if he does have his playtime where the neighbors can’t see him! How dare you come in here and take her home—an insult to me,” letting rage carry her to the top notch of unreason and unrestraint while Mark, sullen yet anxious to appease, was forced to watch the entire procedure. Presently he found opportunity to reply,