Her mission was important--oh, so important! She had compromised with her conscience in planning it, and now if it should fail! Her hand trembled as she knocked.

In answer to Elfrida's "Come in!" she pushed the door slowly open.

"It is I, Janet," she said; "may I ?" "But of course!" Elfrida rose from a confusion of sheets of manuscript upon the table and came forward, holding out her hand with an odd gleam in her eyes, and an amused, slightly excited smile about her lips.
"How do you, do ?" she said, with rather ostentatiously suppressed wonder.

"Please sit down, but not in that chair.

It is not quite reliable.