"Oh, that I wish they could see my lovely tropical home, set in a garden of flowers where the heliotrope grows actually as high as my head."

"You tell about the ball, don't you?" "That is in another letter, the one to Mattie, where I described the big reception at Government House. I told how gorgeous it was and what there was to eat, and how the orchestra played; and said I wished she could have been there, too-"

"Did you remember to put in the newspaper clipping, the one that said only the élite of Georgetown were invited?"

"Yes, Linton, I put that in."

"But"-he raised on his elbow and his voice trembled with apprehension "but you cut off, didn't you, the part at the end where they gave the names of those present? Surely you didn't forget that?"

"Oh no! Of course not."

"Ah, that's good!" he breathed, sinking weakly back on the pillows. "Father will believe it all . . . because you have written it. He wouldn't . . . believe me . . . father wouldn't."

Clarissa winced. Sometimes that was to her the most cruel part of the whole thing. The old man had indeed believed her, for in his will he had stated that his property was to be divided among his daughters, "Not," he'd added, "that I

VOL. CXS-No, 839.-85

would die unforgiving my son, but because of his wealth I feel that my daughters are the more in need."

To deceive one who trusted you, Clarissa moaned. Ah! She hated herself for that!

Linton had dropped into a fitful sort of sleep, in which from time to time he murmured:

"You are sure you posted the letter, Clari?"

He fell asleep again at once, as soon as he was reassured.

For a long time this semblance of his desire, of his ambition, had satisfied him. It was well, Clarissa thought, marveling, since its realization had become forever impossible. But she could not accustom herself to the incredible fact that Linton had given up-Linton, whose indomitable spirit had stoutly resisted climate and failure, denying their very existence.

Facts had never been facts to him. His little roving, eager, blue eyes had always seen visions and in the light of his futures the present had counted for nothing—that is, so long as back there at home "they" did not know!

"I do not matter," Clarissa was wont to say, bitterly.

Now his once - alert, nervous little figure lay oddly listless, content if Clarissa would only reiterate during his every waking moment that myth which he had induced her to help him maintain. To him the semblance had finally become the thing itself.

Clarissa sat alone and idle.

The swift instant of twilight was gone. Night had swooped down like a great black bird on silent wings, in the shadow of which the little tropical city had vanished.

The white oval of Clarissa's face contributed the one high light; for the rest of her, in a mourning frock of lawn hastily thrown together by the negro dressmaker across the street, was as dusky as the room.

She was utterly pathetic to David

Raymond, as he stood in the doorway watching her.

"May I come in?"

"Oh, certainly."

He entered the room, as he always did, like a gust of wind, a healing wind that has blown over pine forests.

He sat down beside Clarissa, who even in her lassitude, unconsciously drew a deeper breath, much as one does when a window is suddenly opened.

There was a pause, in which she did not help him. People said of her, the few she'd met in Georgetown, that you never got anywhere with that poor little Mrs. Holt.

What they really meant, although they did not know how to say it, was that Clarissa was so detached, so remote, that talking to her was like calling to some one across a great distance.

They did not realize that behind the detachment a quivering human spirit hid itself. They did not understand that the remoteness was Clarissa's fortress, which she'd painfully constructed for her protection, much as an oyster constructs a pearl. They did not comprehend that aloofness is the last refuge of those who, for any reason, may not be frank. And Clarissa could not be frank. She lived in fear of betraying Linton.

Even David Raymond, with the sharpened sympathies and keener insight which had come to him in the way of his profession, even he had at first failed to classify Clarissa where she belonged. Then one day he had chanced to overhear Linton's:

"He'll believe because you say so. He wouldn't believe me wouldn't."

father

After that Doctor Raymond had visited his patient with his eyes open.

He sat down now, heavily and a little awkwardly.

Clarissa replied to his questioning that she was feeling well enough and that she was glad to have him come; it was good of him.

...

"I have come ... Several of us have talked it over. You see, Mr. Holt's affairs . . . well, every one knew there'd been reverses. That rubber enterprise Deuced bad luck. What we thought was, knowing how things were We imagined a little something might be realized here and there, and I'd an idea that, after the strain you've gone through, occupation-light occupation, I mean-would be the very best thing for you. . .

Raymond hesitated, little lines of worry gathering on his forehead. He was the direct, out-of-door sort of man who is always floored in an attempt at diplomacy. He mopped his brow now with one of the big North-of-Ireland handkerchiefs which his mother sent him in quantities from Belfast. That soothing operation over, he went on hurriedly, as though the sooner he'd said his say the better:

"There's that shop of Mrs. Price's. She's going to Rio to join her son, you know. . . . As to the shop, she hasn't made a fortune out of it, but I understand she has made a living. Now Iwe thought that with what you'll have we could raise a sum to buy out Mrs. Price stock, good will, and all like that, and that then you-you might run the enterprise for us stockholders!" He finished with an embarrassed laugh.

"Really, Doctor Raymond," Clarissa stammered her amazement, "it's most awfully dear of you all . . . but I'm going home. I've always intended to go home. Oh, of course, I'm going home!"

"We didn't know. I hope we've not presumed. Naturally you would want to go home. I quite understand. If there is anything at all that I can do to helpsettling up affairs, booking passage, and all that sort of thing-"

"Oh yes, and I do appreciate-"

Left to herself, Clarissa summoned her forces. She had been completely languid ever since Linton had gone,

dreamed.

"There are so many practical things to be done," she said as she mounted the stairs.

She was glad Doctor Raymond had come. Otherwise she might have gone on indefinitely dreaming. But how could any one have thought she would remain in Georgetown? Why, she hated it! She hated it all! She hated the heat and the dampness. Why, she even hated the flowers! She wanted to feel a snow-storm driving against her face. She wanted to hear sleigh-bells. She even wanted to eat-to eat buckwheat

cakes and maple syrup.

Home-she'd longed for fifteen years to go home, ever since the first day when Linton had taken her to live in that little shanty and she'd discovered he'd lied to them all, lied even to her!

Clarissa wondered why she hadn't started packing before, why she'd been sitting idle like that, with folded hands, when there was much to be done. It must have been because she was tired, so tired. But meanwhile she might have missed a boat!

She moved feverishly about the room, emptying closets and heaping their contents upon the bed. When she was quite exhausted she stopped to change to an old dressing-gown. The night was steaming. She loosened her hair, which felt damp and heavy on her head, and braided it in two thick braids.

The face that looked back at her out of the mirror, framed as it was by the dark braids, was like a magnolia petal in its pallor.

...

As she looked at her wan face, Clarissa remembered that in the old days Linton had called her a rosebud. . . . How silly men were when you were young! She rubbed her cheeks with the palms of her hands until they glowed faintly.

"Ah!" she thought, "the snow, the snow blowing in my face will bring back the color!" As though the touch of snowflakes could banish the mark of brooding years! For faces bear marks, regardless of whether or not they are lined.

Shaking her head sorrowfully at that colorless replica of herself, she returned to her work, becoming again excited in the turning out of bureau drawers.

Even Linton's clothes, never now to be needed by him, did not depress her. Was she not going home at last? She began to sing softly to herself as she hurried about the room:

"Why, I don't think I've sung sincesince the day I landed! I remember singing then, as I pinned on my hat down in the cabin."

She was piling up Linton's white suits. They were not good for much, frayed as they were at the collars and cuffs, and with little circles of iron-rust around each button. Still, Doctor Raymond could give them to some one.

...

It would be nice to see Mattie again. She wondered if Mattie'd changed much. She supposed having five children did change one. . .

Clarissa turned to survey ber own things heaped on the bed, wondering what she should take with her, and still humming that little air, the air of a music-hall of fifteen years ago.

She inspected her garments one by one. She'd made them all herself. Her sisters would not believe it, for when they had been domestic she had been off skating or paddling or playing tennis.

"No, this old thing is too faded. It's not worth packing. And this must be out of style. I made it four years ago. The materials are cheap, anyhow."

So through the pile; there was nothing worth packing.

"What will they think," she said, "to come home with nothing?"

Then Clarissa reflected that she was in black and that she could explain she'd waited to get home before buying the rest of her mourning. She knew they would wonder she hadn't brought trunks of old finery to her nieces, but Linton's long illness would help there; she could say the things were all out of date. She could picture them laughing over her having been rich so many years that she'd forgotten about "making over."

In this way Clarissa's mind strayed into the familiar channel which every year her life with Linton had worn deeper, the problem of how to perpetuate the fable of their wealth, involving endless discussion of what must or must not be said in order to make "them" think so and so.

Then, all at once, a thought walked into her mind, stalked in like some sinister person entering a room without even a warning knock. That thought put into words was:

had filled her letters with tales of gaiety and prosperity. And she had loathed herself and Linton while she did it.

But through the years she had promised herself that the day would come, must come, when she could go home. That day, she now discovered, she herself, unconsciously, had all along been making impossible. Why had she not foreseen?

The very violence of her grief finally exhausted her and she fell asleep among the pitiable garments of her life. The

There would not even be enough to buy out Mrs. Price's little shop. Doctor Raymond had said so. There'd be

nothing with which to purchase the fine mourning that was to impress them. She would be poor. From years of association, her thoughts ran as Linton's would have done; so long as they did not know, the people in that town who had seen his stern old father order him out of the house, so long as they did not know, you weren't really a failure, you weren't really poor. If only they thought you had succeeded, that was all that mattered. So Clarissa, surrounded by her garments that weren't worth packing, said to herself:

"If I go back I shall be poor!"

Well, she would bear it. She would bear anything if only she might once more feel the snow in her face.

Then a second grim thought entered and stood beside the first:

"But they will find out that all these years I-I have lied about things.

Clarissa sat down on that heap of forlorn clothing and burst at last into a storm of tears. She cried with great sobs, like a heartbroken child.

She had never intended to be false. It had seemed to be forced upon her, increasing by imperceptible degrees, with time. Each small misrepresentation had involved another and a greater. In the beginning how could she have written truly of her life without betraying Linton? So, gradually, at his instigation, she

working, flickered and sputtered and finally burned out.

When Clarissa woke she was singularly calm. After all, it would be good, miraculously good, to feel the weight of deception slip from her; never to have to think any more of what "they" would say, or of how careful she must be lest they suspect this or that, while to be at home would be reward enough for any preliminary humiliation! It was surprising she hadn't thought at once of this way out of her difficulty.

She rose and went over to the chair by the window, resting her arms on the cool sill. The stars were bright with the unearthly brilliance of southern skies. The moon was rising, a molten silver sphere, still low, close to the horizon. Through a break in the avenue of samantrees, it reproduced itself on the gleaming surface of the canal, but less distinct in outline, softer, like a dream moon. It silvered the great white lotus flowers which lay in its path along the

water.

In its luminous radiance the eternal chant of the frogs went on as usual, unabated.

Clarissa reminded herself that she was going home. Soon, when she woke in the night, it would be to hear a heavy freight-train laboring up-grade to the station, stopping, and then going on again into the darkness.

Clarissa stirred. Somewhere behind her she seemed to hear a voice . . . a voice which said: