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176 this one, and thanked him very prettily. He wondered what had happened to her, and why her manner was so strained and conscious. Man-like he attributed.it to his own influence. Was it possible that he was beginning to affect her? He had an immense faith in his power of influencing women. His dark eyes glowed passionately upon her face. To flirt with him at that moment was a distraction, and an anodyne to the fierce pain which tormented her. She felt a wicked pleasure in playing with him as a cat might have played with a mouse. Yes, she would give him some dances. She would not say how many. They would wait until they were in the ball-room. What was it that he wanted to say to her? If it was going to be anything very interesting and exciting she would listen with the greatest pleasure. She wanted to be amused, taken out of herself. Did he think he could do that for her?"

"Yes," Trant answered deliberately. He thought he could at least interest her. He would not promise not to offend her. Perhaps a little at first she might be jarred; women were always jarred by what was real in a man. He meant to be his real self.

Mr. Anderson and Minnie Pryde came in. Minnie was dying to hear all about Lady Waveryng.

They sat in the verandah till it was nearly dressing time. And no one else came. Blake never appeared.

In the evening the Prydes called for her in the jingle—Minnie and her father, who was in one of the Government offices—there was no Mrs. Pryde—and they drove round by the bridge and along the river embankment, till they got into the string of carriages waiting to pass towards the awning stretched out from the entrance to the Club House. The Club was a pretty low building, with wide verandahs and a big garden, gay with coloured lanterns. The covered way from the street was hung with flags, the ball-room looked very brilliant with its decorations of flaming poinsettia against a background of palms. Where had all the crimson flowers come from? There was nothing else—