A Veldt Official. Mitford Bertram

does not see a queer look flit swiftly across the face of her friend.

      “I told you he wasn’t young, and was said to be very reserved,” pursues the latter.

      “Oh yes. A middle-aged fogey, you said.”

      Before she goes to sleep that night Mona Ridsdale lets her thoughts dwell to a very great extent upon the stranger guest; and for his part, the latter, but a few yards off, allows his thoughts to run very considerably upon her.

      That he does so evolves a kind of feeling of self-pity pity not far removed from contempt, yet can he not help it. Beautiful, according to the accepted canons of beauty, she is not, he decides. But of far greater potency than the most faultlessly chiselled features, the classic profile, the ivory-and-roses complexion, which she does not possess, is a certain warm, irresistible power of attractiveness which she does possess, and that to a dangerous degree—the strong under-current of vitality pulsating beneath the dark-complexioned skin, the faultless grace of movement, the straight glance from beneath those clearly marked brows, the vast potentialities of passion that lurk within the swiftly playing eyes. None of this escaped him—all was summed up in the moment he stood face to face with her. In that moment he has read a faulty character, full of puzzling inconsistencies; one which attracts while it repels, yet attracts more than it repels, and it interests him. Nevertheless, the steel armoury of defence, forged by a life’s strange experience, is around him. His mental attitude is that of one who is thoroughly “on guard.”