face was a mask of impenetrability. "If she dies, I shall at least have
the satisfaction of knowing that I made her happy first."

It was his last word on the subject. He departed, leaving the colonel
fuming.

That evening the latter called upon Mrs. Merryon. He found her sitting
on her husband's knee smoking a Turkish cigarette, and though she
abandoned this unconventional attitude to receive her visitor, he had a
distinct impression that the two were in subtle communion throughout his
stay.

"It's so very nice of you to take the trouble," she said, in her
charming way, when he had made his most urgent representations. "But
really it's much better for me to be with my husband here. I stayed at
Shamkura just as long as I could possibly bear it, and then I just had
to come back here. I don't think I shall get ill--really. And if I
do"--she made a little foreign gesture of the hands--"I'll nurse
myself."

As Merryon had foretold, it was useless to argue with her. She
dismissed all argument with airy unreason. But yet the colonel could not
find it in his heart to be angry with her. He was very angry with
Merryon, so angry that for a whole fortnight he scarcely spoke to him.

But when the end of the fortnight came, and with it the first break in
the rains, little Mrs. Merryon went smiling forth and returned his call.

"Are you still being cross with Billikins?" she asked him, while her
hand lay engagingly in his. "Because it's really not his fault, you