Miss Collins's small manicured hand ran easily over her notebook, leaving a trail of cabalistic signs behind it. Char leant back, half-closing her eyes in a way which served to emphasize the tired shadows beneath them, and proceeded with her fluent, unhampered dictation. She was seldom at a loss for a word, and had a positive gift for the production of rhetorical periods which never failed to impress Miss Delmege, still writing at her corner table. In spite of frequent interruptions, Char proceeded unconcernedly enough, until at the eleventh entry of a messenger she broke into an impatient exclamation: "Miss Delmege, please deal for me!" Miss Delmege swept forward, annihilating the unhappy bearer of the card with a look of deep reproach, as she took it from her. "I'm afraid it's some one to see you," she faltered deprecatingly. Char frowned and took the card impatiently, and Miss Delmege stood by looking nervous, as she invariably did when her chief appeared annoyed. Char Vivian, however, although frequently impatient, was not a passionate woman, and however much she might give rein to her tongue, seldom lost control of her temper, for the simple reason that she never lost sight of herself or of her own effect upon her surroundings. Her face cleared as she read the card. "Please ask Captain Trevellyan to come up here." The messenger disappeared thankfully and Miss Delmege retreated relievedly to her corner. Char leant back again in her capacious chair, a sheaf of papers, at which she only cast an occasional glance, before her. She was not at all averse to being found in this attitude, which she judged to be most typical of herself and her work, and for an instant after Captain Trevellyan's booted tread had paused upon the threshold she affected unawareness of his presence and did not raise her eyes. "... I am in receipt of your letter of even date, and would inform you in reply...." "Oh, John! So you've come for an official inspection?" "Since you're never to be seen any other way," he returned, laughing, and grasping her hand. "I ought to send you away; we're in the midst of a heavy day's work." "Don't you think you might call a--a sort of truce of God, for the moment, and tell me something about this office of yours? I'm much impressed by all I hear." Miss Delmege, judging from her chief's smile that this suggestion was approved of, brought forward a chair, and acknowledged Captain Trevellyan's protesting thanks with a genteel bend at the waist and a small, tight smile. The amenities of social intercourse were always strictly held in check by the limits of officialdom by Miss Vivian's staff, with the exception of the unregenerate Miss Collins, who tucked her pencil into her belt, uncrossed her knees, and rose from her chair. "I'm afraid I'm interrupting you," said Trevellyan politely, addressing his remark to Char, but casting a quite unnecessary look at the now smiling Miss Collins. "I've nearly finished," said Char.