She smiled to herself at the thought that things were going to happen to-morrow. She was right. But she had not yet done with the present day. When she entered the cozy and brilliantly lighted veranda of the hotel, the first person her amazed eyes alighted upon was Millicent Jaques. CHAPTER XI WHEREIN HELEN LIVES A CROWDED HOUR "Millicent! You here!" Helen breathed the words in an undertone that carried more than a hint of dismay. It was one of those rare crises in life when the brain receives a presage of evil without any prior foundation of fact. Helen had every reason to welcome her friend, none to be chilled by her unexpected presence. Among a small circle of intimate acquaintances she counted Millicent Jaques the best and truest. They had drifted apart; but that was owing to Helen's lack of means. She was not able, nor did she aspire, to mix in the society that hailed the actress as a bright particular star. Yet it meant much to a girl earning her daily bread in a heedless city that she should possess one friend of her own age and sex who could speak of the golden years when they were children together,--the years when Helen's father was the prospective governor of an Indian province as large as France; when the tuft hunters now gathered in Maloja would have fawned on her mother in hope of subsequent recognition. Why, then, did Helen falter in her greeting? Who can tell? She herself did not know, unless it was that Millicent rose so leisurely from the table at which she was drinking a belated cup of tea, and came toward her with a smile that had no warmth in it. "So you have returned," she said, "and with both cavaliers?" Helen was conscious of a queer humming noise in her head. She was incapable of calm thought. She realized now that the friend she had left in London was here in the guise of a bitter enemy. The veranda was full of people waiting for the post. The snow had banished them from links and tennis court. This August afternoon was dark as mid-December at the same hour. But the rendezvous was brilliantly lighted, and the reappearance of the climbers, whose chances of safety had been eagerly debated since the snow storm began, drew all eyes. Someone had whispered too that the beautiful woman who arrived from St. Moritz half an hour earlier, who sat in her furs and sipped her tea after a long conversation with a clerk in the bureau, was none other than Millicent Jaques, the dancer, one of the leading lights of English musical comedy. The peepers and whisperers little dreamed that she could be awaiting the party from the Forno. Now that her vigil was explained, for Bower had advanced with ready smile and outstretched hand, the Wraggs and Vavasours and de la Veres--all the little coterie of gossips and scandalmongers--were drawn to the center of the hall like steel filings to a magnet.