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410 cut if we didn't, this once. She was rather nice to-day—I liked her."

Basil dropped the talk abruptly there, but Teresa felt that her wish would prevail, and it did. And this gave her a pleasure which seemed to herself pathetic and almost humiliating.

She dressed on the night of the dinner with extraordinary care. She had chosen a mauve dress with touches of silver, which brought out the colour of her eyes. It was a French dress, of rather an extreme fashion; and she followed out the same note of exaggeration in the way she did her hair, making its natural mass appear more strikingly, just as her slight and supple figure was shown to the greatest advantage. Usually she was content to leave her good points more or less to make their own effect, simply; but on this evening her appearance had the touch of obvious art. It would not have been more obvious if she had put rouge on her cheeks. She preferred to look pale; and her pallor was as intense and striking as the rouge would have been.

She came down from her room ready cloaked and hooded, and Basil did not see her otherwise till she entered Mrs. Perry's drawing-room, where a dozen people were assembled. Teresa was aware on her entry that she was frankly stared at, and that Basil was, for a moment, staring too. Among the guests were several that she knew—the Kerrs,