"I like people to be human. Mr. Farron's not human."

"Doesn't your mother think so?"

"Mama thinks he's perfect."

"How long have they been married?"

"Ages! Five years!"

"And they're just as much in love?"

Miss Severance looked at him.

"In love?" she said. "At their age?" He laughed at her, and she added:
"I don't mean they are not fond of each other, but Mr. Farron must be
forty-five. What I mean by love--" she hesitated.

"Don't stop."

But she did stop, for her quick ears told her that some one was coming,
and, Pringle opening the door, Mrs. Farron came in.

She was a very beautiful person. In her hat and veil, lit by the friendly
light of her own drawing-room, she seemed so young as to be actually
girlish, except that she was too stately and finished for such a word.
Mathilde did not inherit her blondness from her mother. Mrs. Farron's
hair was a dark brown, with a shade of red in it where it curved behind
her ears. She had the white skin that often goes with such hair, and a
high, delicate color in her cheeks. Her eyebrows were fine and