Athalie

But mostly she thought of Clive--and of his long silence.

Presently Hafiz woke up, stretched his fluffy, snowy limbs, yawned,

pink-mouthed, then looked up out of gem-clear eyes, blinking

inquiringly at his young mistress.

"Hafiz," she said, "if I don't find employment very soon, what is to

become of you?"

The evening paper, as yet unread, lay on the sofa beside her. She

picked it up, listlessly, glancing at the headings of the front page

columns. There seemed to be trouble in Mexico; trouble in Japan;

trouble in Hayti. Another column recorded last night's heat and gave

the list of deaths and prostrations in the city. Another column--the

last on the front page--announced by cable the news of a fashionable

engagement--a Miss Winifred Stuart to a Mr. Clive Bailey; both at

present in Paris-She read it again, slowly; and even yet it meant nothing to her,

conveyed nothing she seemed able to comprehend.

But halfway down the column her eyes blurred, the paper slipped from

her hands to the floor, and she dropped back into the hollow of the

sofa, and lay there, unstirring. And Hafiz, momentarily disturbed,

curled up on her lap again and went peacefully to sleep.