it had been a stranger to whom all this was happening—­the change being wrought in herself; the immense difference intelligent care, perfectly selected clothes, and the background of a beautiful house can make not only in one’s appearance but in one’s thoughts.  Sometimes she would stare at the perfectly appointed dinner-table, with its softly shaded lights; she would look, reflectively, from Marcia Vandervelde’s smartly coiffured head to her husband’s fine, aristocratic face; the reflective glance would trail around the beautiful room, rest appreciatively upon the impressive butler, come back to the food set before her, and a fugitive smile would touch her lips and linger in her eyes.  There were times when she felt that she herself was the only real thing among shadows; as if all these pleasant things must vanish, and only her lonesome self remain.  She watched with a certain wistfulness the few people she knew.  Marcia, now—­so admired, so sure, with so many interests, so many friends, and with Jason Vandervelde’s quiet love always hers—­did she ever have that haunting sense of the impermanence of all possessions; of having, in the end, nothing but herself?

“What are you thinking, when you look at me like that?” Marcia asked her one evening, smilingly.  She was as curious about Nancy as Nancy was about her.

“I was just—­wondering.”

“About what?”

“I was wondering if you were ever lonely?” said Nancy, truthfully.  “I mean, as if all this,”—­they were in the drawing-room then, and she made a gesture that included everything in it,—­“just things, you know, all the things you have—­and—­and the people you know—­weren’t real.  They go.  And nothing stays but just you. You, all by yourself.”  She leaned forward, her eyes big and earnest.

Marcia Vandervelde stared at her.  After a moment she said, tentatively:  “There are always things; things one has, things one does.  There are always other people.”

“Yes, or there wouldn’t be you, either.  But what I mean is, they go.  And you stay, don’t you?” She paused, a pucker between her brows, “All by yourself,” she finished, in a low voice.

“Does that make you afraid?” asked Mrs. Vandervelde.

“Oh, no!  Why should it?  It just makes me—­wonder.”

Mrs. Vandervelde said quietly:  “I understand.”  Nancy felt grateful to her.

A few days later Mrs. Vandervelde said to her casually:  “An old friend of ours dines with us to-night, Anne,—­Mr. Berkeley Hayden, one of the most charming men in the world.  I think you will like him.”