Out of the veiling brown mists of the picture looked a pair of eyes at which one glance had long been of more moment to him than the chance to look long and steadily into other eyes.  The exquisite lines of a face which, having seen, men did not forget, were there before him, in his possession.  It was the face of the woman, young and rich with beauty and with worldly wealth, who had, three years before, refused to marry Donald Brown.

“How did this come here?  Did Sue leave it?  Or did you?” He questioned the photograph in his mind, staring at it with eager eyes.  “Wasn’t it enough for you to come here to-night, to make me realize how far apart we are?  You like to play with men’s hearts—­so they say.  Don’t you think it’s a bit cruel to play with mine—­now?”

But he looked and looked at the enchanting face.  And even as he looked Doctor Brainard called out from the other room: 

“By the way, Don, I suppose you’ve noticed that Atchison seems to be getting on with his suit.  Everybody thinks it’s either an engagement or likely to be one soon.  Pretty fine match, eh?”

It was a full minute before the answer came.  When it did it sounded a little as if the speaker had his head in the clothespress which opened from the small bedroom, albeit the tone was gay enough: 

“Webb’s one of the best men I know.  He deserves to win whatever he wants.  Do you like a hard pillow or a soft, Doctor?”

XII

BROWN’S OLD WORLD

On a certain morning in February, Mrs. Hugh Breckenridge alighted in haste from her limousine in front of a stately apartment house in the best quarter of a great city.  She hurried through the entrance hall to the lift and was taken up with smooth speed to the seventh story.  In a minute more she was eagerly pressing the button at the door of a familiar suite of rooms into which she had not had occasion to enter for more than a year, for the very good reason that they had been closed and unoccupied in the absence of their tenant.

The returned tenant himself opened the door to her, a tall figure looming in the dusk of an unlighted corridor—­a tall figure infinitely dear to Sue Breckenridge.

“O Don!” cried the visitor in an accusing tone.  “How could you come back without letting us know?”

“I’ve been back only an hour,” explained Donald Brown, submitting to and warmly returning his sister’s embrace.  “How in the world did you hear of it so soon?  Did Brainard—­”

She nodded.  “Mrs. Brainard called me up at once, of course.  She knew you couldn’t be serious in trying to keep people from knowing you were here, least of all your sister!”

“I was intending to come to you before luncheon; I only meant to surprise you.  As for the rest—­I should be glad if they needn’t know; at least until I’m ready to leave.”

“To leave!  Don!  You’re not going to persist in going back!  It can’t be true!  You won’t give up this apartment—­tell me you won’t!”