These words brought a cold shock of reason to Mavis's fevered
excitement.

She looked blankly at the servant for a moment or two, before
saying:

"Thank you, Parkins; I will wait inside."

If her many weeks of looking for employment had taught her nothing
else, they now told her how worse than foolish it would be to
shatter at one blow Mrs Hamilton's good opinion of her. In
compliance with her employer's request, she returned to the drawing-
room, her nerves all on edge.

Although more convinced than before of the presence of some
abomination, she made a supreme effort to divert her thoughts into
channels promising relief from her present tension of mind.

She caught up and eagerly examined the first thing that came to
hand. It was a large, morocco-bound, gold-edged photograph album;
almost before she was aware of it, she was engrossed in its
contents. It was full from cover to cover of coloured photographs of
women. There were dark girls, fair girls, auburn girls, every type
of womanhood to be met with under Northern skies; they ranged from
slim girls in their teens to over-ripe beauties, whose principal
attraction was the redundance of their figures. For all the immense
profusion of varied beauty which the women displayed, they had
certainly two qualities in common--they all wore elaborate evening
dress; they were all photographed to display to the utmost advantage