Edmée was called to the telephone, and Mr. Hardy surprised me by springing rather than walking to my side of the room.

“Tell me what you are thinking as you look at those old frumps.”

“They aren’t frumps. I was thinking that once they were girls just like me, and wondering did they long for things as I do.”

“Don’t worry about them; they all had their day. Take yours while you can. They weren’t like you: they were ordinary.”

The camellia fell from his button-hole and I hastened to replace it as Edmée returned. She laughed something about the white flower of a blameless life, and her glance had that flicker which saves her from being overlooked by the men who like women who are up in masculine sophistications, and condone them.

As Mr. Hardy was bidding good-night to Edmée he said casually, “I want your little friend to meet Cunningham the publisher tomorrow morning. I could send a cab for her.”

“She will be delighted to go; it is good of you to take an interest in her,” said Edmée without consulting me.

“Imagine him staying all that time—wasn’t going to spare a moment at first—haw-haw, the great man!” said Edmée.

“But he went to telephone to get time immediately he saw you. Why don’t you distract him?”

“What would be the use? A man of his tastes must marry money, and he’s old enough in the horn to know it. But he’s most fascinating.”

Edmée telephoned the friends, to whom she had been going, of her triumph. Mr. Hardy had come for five minutes with the prodigy, but had stayed with her, and, as Mrs. Crasterton was ill, she could not leave the ship, and so on. Well, it was lucky when people came and saw that I was nothing, that Edmée was on hand to save them from disappointment.

The parlour maid was admitting Big Ears, so I sped to my room and left him to Edmée. I felt sure that Mr. Hardy had noticed my sash. I had not previously been noticed so intensely by sophistication, and found it thrilling. I sat down to enjoy my diary.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

I DIDN’T SAY ANYTHING.

Mrs. Crasterton recovered on the morrow, and in the afternoon Mr. Hardy sent a cab for us and we went to meet him at the GREAT AUSTRALIAN PUBLISHER’S. People ran forward at sight of Mrs. Crasterton, and one after another conducted us through the lovely book store. Oh, the books! We went up stairs, with books everywhere, and pictures of celebrities, and entered a new kind of room to me. There were more books and pictures, but also lovely easy chairs and two desks. Goring Hardy was at one, and a terribly polite man at the other. The publisher man was away in Melbourne.

The polite man chatted to Mrs. Crasterton. Goring Hardy excused himself, something entailed cabling. Mrs. Crasterton and the Polite Man continued a conversation on family matters while I gazed about me. Oh, the books! Mrs. Crasterton had another engagement, and the Polite Man said she could leave the little lady in his charge, and he or Mr. Hardy would send her home safely in a cab. Mr. Hardy made many apologies and escorted Mrs. Crasterton down stairs with most knightly tenderness, making jokes and yarning. When he returned he dived into his papers again without taking any notice of me. The Polite Man talked to me a while and then began to shut drawers, got his stick and hat, straightened his waistcoat in the way which suggests it would be more comfortable to bone this garment unaffectedly like a bodice. Then he whispered that Mr. Hardy would soon be done, and departed. Mr. Hardy, with his nose down, said that if anything urgent came in he would attend to it.