admired her more.  He sat down and asked her how she was, and, as he looked at her, he wondered to think that she had ever fainted.  Clearly, she was the last woman on earth who could be accused of Victorian ways, and to see her in her white lace dress, dark, distinguished, and perfectly mistress of her emotions, was to be bewildered at the memory.  She treated the question with scant ceremony, and remarked upon the fact that the night had been hot, and that everyone had felt it.

“I’ve got an excellent reason for remembering the date,” said Hartley reflectively.  “By the way, wasn’t Absalom, old Mhtoon Pah’s assistant, once a dressing-boy or something in your establishment?”

“He was, and then he went sick, and took to this other kind of work.”

“He was quite honest, I suppose?”

“Perfectly honest,” said Mrs. Wilder, with a slight lift of her eyebrows, “and a nice little boy.  I hope that question doesn’t mean that you are professionally interested in his past?” she laughed carelessly.  “I am quite prepared to stand up for Absalom; he was the soul of integrity.”

Hartley put down his cup on the table.

“The boy has disappeared,” he said, talking with interest, for the subject filled his mind.

“But when, and how?  I saw him quite lately.”

Hartley’s round, China-blue eyes fixed upon her.

“Can you tell me when you saw him?”

“One night—­evening, I should say—­I was out riding and I passed him going towards the wharf, not towards the wharf exactly, but to the houses that lie out by the end of the tram lines.”

“What evening?  I wish you could remember for me.”

“It was the night of my own dinner-party.”

“Then that was July the twenty-ninth?”

Mrs. Wilder looked at him, and bit her lip.

“Was it the twenty-ninth?” Hartley repeated the question.

“Probably it was, if you say so.  I told you just now that I had Burma head.  But where has Absalom gone to?”

Hartley took up his cup again and stirred the spoon round and round.

“Forgive me for pelting you with questions, but did you see Mr. Heath that evening?”

“Now, what are you trying to get out of me, Mr. Hartley?  Did Mr. Heath tell you that he had seen me?”

Hartley stared at his feet.

“Heath has got Burma head, too, and won’t tell me anything.  It might help his memory if you were able to say whether you had seen him or not that evening.”

Mrs. Wilder’s fine eyes glittered into a smile that was not exactly mirthful or pleasant.

“I don’t see that I can possibly say one way or another.  I often do . . .  I often do see him going about the native quarter when I ride through, but I do not write it down in my book, so it is quite impossible for me to say.”

“Anyhow, you saw Absalom?”

“Oh, yes, I saw the boy.  What a persistent man you are, and you haven’t told me a word yourself.”