There was a faint rise in her color, but no loss of sell-possession.
"Please don't scold the nurse," she said, "nor say anything to Mrs.
Barker.

It is all my fault.

I thought that both the nurse and child looked dreadfully bored with each other, and I borrowed the little fellow for a while to try and amuse him.

At least I haven't made him cry, have I, dear ?" The last epithet, it is needless to say, was addressed to the little creature in her lap, but in its tender modulation it touched the father's quick sympathies as if he had shared it with the child.

"You see," she said softly, disengaging the baby fingers from her necklace, "that OUR sex is not the only one tempted by jewelry and glitter." Barker hesitated; the Madonna-like devotion of a moment ago was gone; it was only the woman of the world who laughingly looked up at him.
Nevertheless he was touched.