and yet with eyes that were almost too gentle in their
welcoming.

"My dear little Fleda! you're as lovely as you can be! Are you
glad to see me?"

"Very."

"Why don't you ask after somebody else?"

"I was afraid of overtasking your exhausted energies."

"Come, and sit down here upon my lap! — You shall, or I won't
say another word to you. Fleda! you've grown thin! what have
you been doing to yourself?"

"Nothing, with that particular purpose."

"I don't care — you've done something. You have been insanely
imagining that it is necessary for you to be in three or four
places at the same time; and in the distracted effort after
ubiquity, you are in imminent danger of being nowhere; there's
nothing left of you!"

"I don't wonder you were overcome at the sight of me," said
Fleda.

"But you are looking charmingly for all that," Constance went
on; "so charmingly, that I feel a morbid sensation creeping
all over me while I sit regarding you. Really, when you come