Page:The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg (1928).djvu/277

 gained the courage to ask where Miss Fosdick was hiding. He was not interested in auras except as nonsense. (It was absurd that a man of his age should be as shy as a schoolboy. Why could he not utter Miss Fosdick's name?)

"Yes, it is a profound and interesting subject."

"Have you noticed my own?" asked Mr. Winnery wildly.

"Oh, yes, I noticed it at once yesterday by its paleness. I had seldom seen so pale an aura. But it has changed today remarkably. It is much redder."

"And what does that signify?"

Mrs. Weatherby simpered. "I don't know that I ought to tell you, Mr. Winnery. Still, you are an intelligent man and will not misinterpret my interest in such things."

"Yes . . . no . . . of course not," murmured Mr. Winnery.

"Red," said Mrs. Weatherby, "indicates passions of the body. I think—" she hesitated for a moment and then plunged. "I think someone, something, some new—shall I say—interest?—has entered your life since yesterday."

"Oh," said Mr. Winnery, somewhat startled. But he was aware again that he was flattered by the change in his aura.

"Green is the color of the passions of the mind. That of course is much worse . . . depraved, one might say." She was peering at him through her glistening pince-nez with a mystical intensity that made him squirm on the hard chair. He saw with terror that she was scrutinizing his aura. "I am glad