other words, as Aunt Maud engaged her friend, lis
tening with the handsomest response to Mrs. String-
ham's impression of the scene they had just quitted.
It was in the tone of the fondest indulgence almost,
really, that of dove cooing to dove that Mrs. Low-
der expressed to Milly the hope that it had all gone
beautifully. Her " all " had an ample benevolence;
it soothed and simplified; she spoke as if it were the
two young women, not she and her comrade, who
had been facing the town together. But Milly's
answer had prepared itself while Aunt Maud was on
the stair; she had felt in a rush all the reasons that
would make it the most dovelike; and she gave it,
while she was about it, as earnest, as candid. " I
don't think, dear lady, he's here."

It gave her straightway the measure of the success
she could have as a dove: that was recorded in the
long look of deep criticism, a look without a word,
that Mrs. Lowder poured forth. And the word,
presently, bettered it still. " Oh, you exquisite
thing! " The luscious innuendo of it, almost start
ling, lingered in the room, after the visitors had
gone, like an oversweet fragrance. But left alone
with Mrs. Stringham Milly continued to breathe it:
she studied again the dovelike and so set her compan
ion to mere rich reporting that she averted all inquiry
into her own case.

That, with the new day, was once more her law
though she saw before her, of course, as something
of a complication, her need, each time, to decide.

[[310]]

p309 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p310w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p311

v?