where she tried vainly to restrain them. Her face
had altered too, like her voice, haggard lines
suddenly appearing about the eyes and mouth as if
they had just been pencilled there: the truth
issuing from beneath her pinchbeck simulations, like
a tragic mask revealed by the displacement of a
tawdry covering.

"I expect you think I'm real foolish," she said,
"but I be'n waitin' so awful long--and I got a good
deal of worry on my mind till I see Mr. Louden."

"I am sorry," Ariel turned from the roses, and
faced her and the heavy perfume. "I hope he
will come soon."

"I hope so," said the other. "It's something to
do with me that keeps him away, and the longer he
is the more it scares me." She shivered and set her
teeth together. "It's kind of hard, waitin'. I
cert'nly got my share of troubles."

"Don't you think that Mr. Louden will be able
to take care of them for you?"

"Oh, I HOPE so, Miss Tabor! If he can't,
nobody can." She was crying openly now, wiping
her eyes with her musk-soaked handkerchief. "We
had to send fer him yesterday afternoon--"