* * * * *

On the top of her matchmaking and her reflections on Truth in the guise of
the Veiled Prophet of Khorasan, came Clem Sypher to take possession of his
new house. Since Zora had seen him in Monte Carlo he had been to New York,
Chicago, and San Francisco, fighting the Jebusa Jones dragon in its lair.
He had written Zora stout dispatches during the campaign. Here a victory.
There a defeat. Everywhere a Napoleonic will to conquer--but everywhere
also an implied admission of the almost invulnerable strength of his enemy.

"I'm physically tired," said he, on the first day of his arrival, spreading
his large frame luxuriously among the cushions of Mrs. Oldrieve's
chintz-covered Chesterfield. "I'm tired for the only time in my life. I
wanted you," he added, with one of his quick, piercing looks. "It's a
curious thing, but I've kept saying to myself for the last month, 'If I
could only come into Zora Middlemist's presence and drink in some of her
vitality, I should be a new man.' I've never wanted a human being before.
It's strange, isn't it?"

Zora came up to him, tea in hand, a pleasant smile on her face.

"The Nunsmere air will rest you," she said demurely.

"I don't think much of the air if you're not in it. It's like whiskey-less
soda water." He drew a long breath. "My God! It's good to see you again.
You're the one creature on this earth who believes in the Cure as I do
myself."

Zora glanced at him guiltily. Her enthusiasm for the Cure as a religion was