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 strawberries. . . . Louise has known her a long while?"

"For years."

"Delightful woman! So sensible. How lucky that she is able to help you with your accounts. You never could add."

"Rather. I don't know how we could get on without her."

"Is she stopping long?"

"Well, we can't put her in a pumpkin shell, like Peter, and keep her forever."

"She must feel rather cut off from her own people, out here. Where is her home?"

"She used to live in Washington. She has seen what are known as better days."

"One guesses that . . . For heaven's sake, Keble, who is she? You know I'm only beating about the bush."

"She never speaks of her family. Most of it's dead."

"Cread—Cread." Alice was lying in wait for an image that kept eluding her, when suddenly she captured it. "Cowes! Of course. Before the war, at the Graybridge place . . . You remember Aurelie Graybridge,—she was Aurelie Streeter of New York. It was a garden party, after a race, and Admiral Cread was there with the American Ambassador. How stupid of me to have forgotten! I must remind her."

Keble was uneasy. "I don't think I would, Alice, unless she does first. She's uncommonly reticent