"Dance?" I queried. "What dance, and where?"

"Well, Madame Didier, that jolly little furbelowed Frenchwoman with
whom I was driving just now, has got up a regular party to-night--"

"Hans Breitmann gib a barty?" I interposed, with a mock solemn air
of inquiry.

Amy laughed.

"Well, yes, it MAY be that kind of thing, for all I know to the
contrary. Anyhow, she's hired the band and ordered a right-down
elegant supper. Half the folks in the hotel are going, and a lot of
outsiders have got invitations. She asked if we couldn't come--
myself, the Colonel, and you. I said I could answer for myself and
the Colonel, but not for you, as you were an invalid. But if you
keep on looking as you do at present, no one will believe that
there's anything the matter with you.--Tea, Alphonse!"

This to a polite waiter, who was our special attendant, and who just
then knocked at the door to know "madame's" orders.

Utterly disbelieving what my friend said in regard to my improved
appearance, I rose from the bed and went to the dressing-table to
look in the mirror and judge for myself. I almost recoiled from my
own reflection, so great was my surprise. The heavy marks under my
eyes, the lines of pain that had been for months deepening in my
forehead, the plaintive droop of the mouth that had given me such an
air of ill-health and anxiety--all were gone as if by magic. I saw a