hint of such a world was suggested by the surroundings of this party of pleasure-seekers.

Yet there was a cloud on the face of the mistress of all this gayety. Mrs. Carlton herself was evidently disturbed and unhappy. Even her accustomed habit of self-control, that mask which society often compels its slaves to wear, could not conceal her real feelings.

"What is the matter, Louise?" asked one of her friends, Mrs. Lynde, as she stopped by the hostess near the staircase; "are you ill?"

"No, but I'm worried about Inez and her father. A telegram just came, saying they would be here on the one-o'clock train. Of course I feel badly about Claude and all that. It seems almost unfortunate that the party should come so soon after, and all this other——. I feel a little nervous about it; but of course I could not foresee events."

"Of course not. You owe something to society. This will be the event of the season."

"Do you think so?" Mrs. Carlton spoke anxiously, but her face lighted up with the selfish pleasure of a woman who has reached a point where the one great object of her life is to win the distinction of surpassing all other society leaders in social ways.

"There is no doubt of it. See if The Sunday Caterer does not say so." And Mrs. Lynde passed into the next room.

Mrs. Carlton looked pleased; and, as she mingled with the young people, her face seemed to lose its anxious look.

But, when the last game had been played, the refreshments served, the last guest had gone, and she was alone, she betrayed at once the unrest and excitement she had been unable to conceal during a large part of the evening.

It was half-past twelve, and she sat down in the hall reception-room, and waited for her husband and daughter. As she sat there, her mind was busy with thoughts that made her grow increasingly unhappy.

Her husband had been called abroad six months before, and had taken their only child, Inez, with him. She was nineteen years old, and had been studying art at home. When Claude Vernon died, Mrs. Carlton knew that Inez and her father were about to sail for home. Her last letter from them had come from Athens. Mrs. Carlton had not written the news of the tragedy at Judge Vernon's because she knew it would not have time to reach them before they sailed.

This was what troubled her now. It was possible that Inez and Mr. Carlton might reach home in ignorance of Claude's death. Mrs. Carlton suspected that before she went away Inez had come to have more than a girl's fancy for Claude. How far her feelings had gone the mother did not know. How severely the blow would fall on her daughter she was unable to conjecture. But, as she looked around the elegant rooms, heavily perfumed with the evening's adornment, she could not avoid a feeling of dread at what the home-coming of the father and daughter might mean. With it all was also more than a vague self-reproach that this party had followed so close upon the death of Claude Vernon.

She rose and nervously turned out the light in one of the rooms, as if to shut out the sight of the evening's gayety. She even carried several vases of roses into the library, and removed from the hallway some of the carnations that had stood there. As she came back and opened the door, feeling oppressed by the air in the house, a carriage drove up, and the travellers greeted her gayly as they came up the veranda steps.

With the first glance at her daughter, whose face she sought even before that of her husband, Mrs. Carlton knew that she was still ignorant of Claude's death.

"Why, mother, you have been having a gay time during our absence. 'When the cat's away, the mice will play;' isn't that so, father?" cried Inez, as she flung her arms about her mother, while Mr. Carlton said something with a laugh, and kissed his wife as she turned to him from her daughter's embrace.

"I've been having a little company to-night," Mrs. Carlton answered slowly. "Just a few of our friends. It was such a disappointment that you came just too late for it."

"Who has been here, mother?" asked Inez, as she put her arm about her mother and playfully drew her into the dining-room.