impatiently:

"Cliff is only a boy, and a rather foolish one at that. But to continue. All this nonsense, as you call it, Nan, will be of brief duration, and my advice is to make the best of it."

"There is a worse time coming," Mollie declared. "The Vortex has wrought changes enough, but I don't suppose we will recognize the old place at all when the magnificent Miss Stuart arrives."

"Sufficient unto the day," said Nan. "Well, good-by, girls I must be off."

When the door had closed upon her two friends, Eleanor went back to the window, and leaning against the casement, looked abstractedly out. She thought of Cliff, and the disappointed look his face had worn when she spoke to him so rudely. Certainly Cliff had come under the spell that was over them all this eventful summer. She had striven to deter him, but in spite of her best efforts, he had found a moment in which to tell her of his love. To this she had lent the coldest ear, holding out to him no hope whatever. Cliff had listened very patiently, but there was something in his quiet refusal to accept this answer as final that had made Eleanor, woman of the world as she was, feel singularly helpless. They had taken up life again just where they had left it before Cliff spoke, and since then no reference had been made to the matter.

The smile had quite died out of Eleanor's 93 face. She went over to her writing table and picked up a little note which Cliff had written her on some trifling matter. She looked at it for a moment, then half raised it to her lips. With a shame-faced laugh she dropped it back among the letters on her table and turned impatiently away.

93

One sultry morning toward the end of July, as Helen sat sewing on the upper balcony, a maid came out through the French window with a small tray in her hand, on which lay a yellow envelope. Helen leaned forward and picked up the telegram.

"Thank you, Susie. Is the boy waiting?"

"Yes, Miss."

"Well, you may go. I will bring the answer down myself when I have it ready."

When the maid had withdrawn Helen tore open the envelope. The message read thus: "Can you come to town for the night? Want to see you. Please don't disappoint. L. S."

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