on whom she turned them ignored the lack of boldness in chin and
nose. Her hair was brown and arranged in the latest fashion,
while her complexion was so fresh and pink that, if she did paint
--as jealous women averred--she must have been quite an artist
with the hare's foot and the rouge pot and the necessary powder
puff.

Mrs. Jasher's clothes repaid the thought she expended upon them,
and she was artistic in this as in other things. Dressed in a
crocus-yellow gown, with short sleeves to reveal her beautiful
arms, and cut low to display her splendid bust, she looked
perfectly dressed. A woman would have declared the wide-netted
black lace with which the dress was draped to be cheap, and would
have hinted that the widow wore too many jewels in her hair, on
her corsage, round her arms, and ridiculously gaudy rings on her
fingers. This might have been true, for Mrs. Jasher sparkled
like the Milky Way at every movement; but the gleam of gold and
the flash of gems seemed to suit her opulent beauty. Her
slightest movement wafted around her a strange Chinese perfume,
which she obtained--so she said--from a friend of her late
husband's who was in the British Embassy at Pekin. No one
possessed this especial perfume but Mrs. Jasher, and anyone who
had previously met her, meeting her in the darkness, could have
guessed at her identity. With a smile to show her white teeth,
with her golden-hued dress and glittering jewels, the pretty
widow glowed in that glimmering room like a tropical bird.

The Professor raised his dreamy eyes and laid the beetle on one
side, when his brain fully grasped that this charming vision was
waiting to be entertained. She was better to look upon even than