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RV 105 Pauline's sense of humour was not unfailing, but this relaxed her taut nerves, and she laughed. "Poor Michelangelo!"

"I thought it wouldn't worry you. But what is worrying Amalasuntha is that he won't be let—"

"Be let?"

"By Lita. Her theory is that Lita will fall madly in love with Michelangelo as soon as she lays eyes on him and that when they've had one dance together she'll be lost. And Amalasuntha, for that reason—though she daren't tell you so—thinks it might really be cheaper in the end to pay Michelangelo's debts than to import him. As she says, it's for the family to decide, now she's warned them."

Their laughter mingled. It was the first time, perhaps, since they had been young together; as a rule, their encounters were untinged with levity.

But Pauline dismissed the laugh hurriedly for the Grant Lindons. At the name Wyant's eyes lit up: it was as if she had placed an appetizing morsel before a listless convalescent.

"But you're the very person to tell me all about it—or, no, you can't, of course, if Manford's going to take it up. But no matter—after all, it's public property by this time. Seen this morning's 'Looker-on' with pictures? Here, where—" In the stack of illustrated papers always at his elbow he could never find the one he wanted, and now began to toss over "Prattlers," "Listeners" and others with helpless hand. How that little symptom of inefficiency