Green Fancy

"I wish you had been a little more explicit in your telegram, Tom," she said peevishly. "If I had known who she is I wouldn't have put her in that room. Now, I shall have to move Aunt Kate back into it to- morrow, and give Miss Cameron the big one at the end of the hall." Which goes to prove that Tom's sister was a bit of a snob in her way. "Stop walking like that, and come here." She faced him accusingly. "Have you told me ALL there is to tell, sir?"

"Can't you see for yourself, Ede, that I'm in love with her? Desperately, horribly, madly in love with her. Don't giggle like that! I couldn't have told you while she was present, could I?"

"That isn't what I want to know. Is she in love with YOU? That's what I'm after."

"Yes," said he, but frowned anxiously.

"She is perfectly adorable," said she, and was at once aware of a guilty, nagging impression that she would not have said it to him half an hour earlier for anything in the world.

The Countess was strangely white and subdued when she rejoined them later on. She had removed her hat. The other woman saw nothing but the wealth of sun-kissed hair that rippled. Barnes went forward to meet her, filled with a sudden apprehension.

"What is it? You are pale and--what have you heard?"

She stopped and looked searchingly into his eyes. A warm flush rose to her cheeks; her own eyes grew soft and tender and wistful.

"They all believe that the war will last two or three years longer," she said huskily. "I cannot go back to my own country till it is all over. They implore me to remain here with them until--until my fortunes are mended." She turned to Mrs. Courtney and went on without the slightest trace of indecision or embarrassment in her manner. "You see, Mrs. Courtney, I am very, very poor. They have taken everything. I--I fear I shall have to accept the kind, the generous proffer of a--" her voice shook slightly--"of a home with my friends until the Huns are driven out."

Barnes's silence was more eloquent than words. Her eyes fell. Mrs. Courtney's words of sympathy passed unheard; her bitter excoriation of the Teutons and Turks was but dimly registered on the inattentive mind of the victim of their ruthless greed; not until she expressed the hope that Miss Cameron would condescend to accept the hospitality of her home until plans for the future were definitely fixed was there a sign that the object of her concern had given a thought to what she was saying.