For once
she was swayed from her stillness and stolidity. She loaded her long
hands with rings, and held them to her cheeks; then, struck by the
contrast of her white linen sleeve, she rummaged in one of the big
closets, and threw on the bed a drift of exquisite apparel.
The gowns were all too small for her, but there was a cloak of velvet
and ermine. The General's wife had worn it to the White House dinner
over the gown in which she had been painted. Hilda drew the cloak
about her shoulders, and laughed noiselessly. She could look like
this, and she had never known it! But now that she knew--!
There was the soft click of the telephone in the General's room.
Fearful lest the sound should waken her patient, she tore off the
tiara, turned up the neck of her dress to hide the shining collar,
dropped the cloak, pulled the chain of the lamp, then sped breathless
to the shadowed room.
Dr. McKenzie was at the other end of the wire.
"I am coming over, Hilda."
"You need not,"--her voice was a whisper--"he is sound asleep."
"I want to see you for a moment. It is very important."
She hesitated.
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