Lola’s lips curled into a smile. It was impossible to resist this woman and her peculiar way of putting things. “But I think you know me better than that,” she said, twining that thick wiry hair round the tongs as an Italian twines spaghetti round a fork. “What makes you think so? I don’t know you. I haven’t the remotest idea what you’re like. You never tell me anything. Ever since you’ve been with me you’ve never let me see under your skin once. I don’t even believe that you’re Breezy’s niece. I’ve only her word for it. After Sunday morning’s exhibition, I’m quite inclined to believe that you _are_ Madame de Brézé masquerading as a lady’s maid. If the War was still going on, I might think that you were a spy. A great idea for you to get into this house and pinch the papers of a Cabinet Minister. Yes, of course you can have a week off. What are you going to do? Get married, after all?” Lola shook her head and the curl went away from her lips. “I want to go down to the country for a little rest,” she said. Something in the tone of Lola’s voice caught Feo’s ears. She looked sharply at her reflection in the glass and saw that the little face which had captured her fancy and become so familiar had suddenly taken on an expression of so deep a yearning as to make it almost unrecognizable. The wide-apart eyes burned with emotion, the red lips and those sensitive nostrils denoted a pent-up excitement that was startling. What was it that this strange, secretive child had made up her mind to do—to commit—to lose? “There is love at the bottom of this,” she said. And Lola replied, “Yes, my lady,” simply and with a sort of pride. And then took hold of herself, tight. If there had been any one person in all the world to whom she could have poured out her little queer story of all-absorbing love and desire to serve and comfort and inspire and entertain and rejuvenate—— But there wasn’t one—and it was Mr. Fallaray’s wife who fished to know her secret. Was it one of the ordinary coincidences which had brought, them together—meaningless and accidental—or one of those studied ironies which fate, in its mischievous mood, indulges in so frequently? “It wouldn’t have been any good to deny it. It’s all over you like a label. It’s an infernal nuisance, Lola, but I’ll try and get on without you. If you’re not going to get married, watch your step, as the Americans say. I don’t give you this tip on moral grounds but from the worldly point of view. You have your living to make and there’s Breezy to think about and your people.”