About midnight she was quiet, and Dan, going near her, discovered that she drowsed. His foot touched something upon the carpet, and he picked up the string of artificial pearls, put it upon the table beside the bed, then tiptoed out of the room, closing the door with great care to make no noise. The house was silent and solidly dark as he went down the broad stairway and opened the front door to let himself out into the faint illumination of the summer night. It was a night profoundly hushed and motionless; and within it, enclosed in heat, the town lay prostrate. Sighing heavily, the young husband walked to and fro upon the short grass of the lawn, wondering what had “happened” to Lena—as he thought of it—to upset her so; wondering, too, what had happened to himself, that since he had married her she had most of the time seemed to him to be, not the Lena he thought he knew, but an inexplicable stranger. This was a mystery beyond his experience, and he could only sigh and shake his inadequate head; meanwhile pacing beneath the midnight stars. But they were neither puzzled nor surprised, those experienced stars, so delicately bright in the warm sky, for they had looked down upon uncounted other young husbands in his plight and pacing as he did. By and by he stood still, aware of another presence in the dimness of the neighbouring yard. The only sound in all the world seemed to be a minute tinkling and plashing of water where the stoic swan maintained himself at his duty while other birds slept; but upon the stone rim of the fountain Dan thought he discerned a white figure sitting. He went to the fence between the two lawns to make sure, and found that he was right; a large and graceful woman sat there, leaning over and drawing one hand meditatively to and fro through the water. “Martha?” he said in a low voice. She looked up, said “Dan!” under her breath, and came to the fence. “Why, you poor thing! You’re still in that heavy long coat!” “Am I?” he asked vaguely. “I hadn’t noticed.” “‘Hadn’t noticed?’ In this weather!” “It _is_ fairly hot,” he said, as though this circumstance had just been called to his attention. “Then why don’t you take it off?” “My coat?” he returned absently. “I don’t mind it.” “I do,” Martha said. “You don’t need to bother about talking to _me_ with your coat off, do you? It’s only a dozen years or so since we hid our shoes and stockings in the harness closet in your stable and ran off barefoot to go wading in the street after a thunderstorm. Take it off.” “Well——” He complied, explaining, “I just came out to get cool.” “So did I; but I don’t believe it can be done, Dan. I believe this is the worst night for sheer hotness we’ve had in two or three years. I haven’t felt it so much since the day I landed in New York from Cherbourg, summer before last. I’ll never forget that day!” “In New York?” he asked, astonished.