"How is your father, Derry?"

"Better, Drusilla. He has a fine nurse. Dr. McKenzie sent her."

"And I have Emily," Jean sang from the corner of the big car where
Derry had her penned in, with the fragrance of her violets sweeping
over him as he sat next to her. "I want Emily always, but Daddy has to
have a nurse in the office, and Emily won't give up her toys. And in
the meantime Hilda and I are ready to scratch each other's eyes out.
Please keep her as long as you can on your father's case, Mr. Drake."

"Say 'Derry,'" he commanded under cover of the light laughter of the
women.

"Not before---everybody--"

"Whisper it, then."

"Derry, Derry."

His pulses pounded. During the rest of the drive, he spoke to his
other guests and seemed to listen, but he heard nothing--nothing but
the whisper of that beloved voice.

As Derry had said, all the world of Washington was at the ball. The
President and his wife in a flag-draped box, she in black with a
turquoise fan, he towering a little above her, more than President in
these autocratic days of war. They looked down on men in the uniforms
of the battling world--Scot and Briton and Gaul--in plaid and khaki and