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 Austin answered, wondering if Miss Hayes would ever come back. "David tells me he's lost ten pounds."

"David!" exclaimed Susie, as if it were an impertinence for David to have lost an ounce on her account. Then she added, with a smile, "Have you been losing weight, Austin?"

"My weight never varies very much," he answered, and cut the meal short by rising to his feet.

He admitted to himself one disadvantage of being the masculine head of a feminine institution—a head-mistress would have gone straight to the bedside of a sick pupil, whereas he, the only person who really understood her, was obliged to content himself with sending Miss Curtis, running up-stairs like a rabbit, to bring him word.

"You must take us over and show us your dear little cottage," said Mrs. Rolles.

"Just as soon as Miss Curtis comes back with news of Elise," he answered.

"One trouble with her is she doesn't eat anything," said Mrs. Rolles. "Girls go through an age, you know, when they think it's romantic to starve themselves."

"Didn't she eat anything at all?" asked Austin, seriously.