“Now, my dear, do sit down again and drink your tea quietly. What good will all this worrying do? You look feverish--and as thin as a rail. Are you sure you haven’t picked up one of those dreadful tropical microbes?... Of course, I understand your being unhappy at parting so soon again with Anne.... She feels it too; I know she does. It’s a pity you couldn’t have been together a little longer, just you two; but then--. And, after all, since Anne wants you to keep the Fifth Avenue house for yourself, why shouldn’t the young people buy that property just round the corner? Then the lower floors of the two houses could be thrown into one for entertaining. I’m not clever about plans, but Lilla’ll tell you exactly how it could be done. She’s got hold of such a clever young architect to modernize their Baltimore house. Of course, though Horace didn’t realize it, it was _all_ library; no room for dancing. And I daresay Anne--not that Anne ever cared much for dancing.... But I hear Major Fenno likes going out, and a young wife can’t make a greater mistake than to have a dull house if her husband is fond of gaiety. Lilla, now, has quite converted Horace--” Kate Clephane had reseated herself and was automatically turning the spoon about in her cup. “It won’t happen; it can’t be; he’ll never dare.” The thought, flashing in on her aching brain, suddenly quieted her, helped her to compose her features, and even to interject the occasional vague murmur which was all her sister-in-law needed to feed her flow of talk. The mention of the Maclews and their clever architect had served to deflect the current of Mrs. Drover’s thoughts, and presently she was describing how wonderfully Lilla managed Horace, and how she and the architect had got him to think he could not live without the very alterations he had begun by resolutely opposing, on the ground that they were both extravagant and unnecessary. “Just an innocent little conspiracy, you know.... They completely got the better of him, and now he’s delighted, and tells everybody it was his own idea,” Mrs. Drover chuckled; and then, her voice softening, and a plump hand reassuringly outstretched to Mrs. Clephane: “You’ll see, my dear, after you get over the first loneliness, what a lovely thing it is to have one’s child happily married.” “It won’t happen; it can’t be; he’ll never dare!” the other mother continued to murmur to herself. * * * * *