re in our committee meetings, Mr. Dane."

"I haven't the slightest doubt of it," Bobby responded, with unctuous
emphasis.

"When is the concert to be, Mrs. Avalons?" Beatrix asked hastily, with a
frown at her cousin who stared blandly back at her.

"The first week in May, if we can possibly be ready for it. There was so
much, just before Lent, that we postponed it until after Easter. Now we
are no better off, for every day is full, so we are delaying it again.
We want to make it a large affair, don't you know, something that will
attract the swell set and the musical people, too."

If Bobby Dane hated one word in the language, that word was _swell_.
Accordingly, he glared haughtily across the table at Mrs. Lloyd
Avalons, noting, as he did so, the scornful cadence of her voice over
the final phrase.

"The two sets rarely mingle, Mrs. Avalons. Which is under your especial
care?"

Lorimer interposed hurriedly, for he felt the hostility in Bobby's tone,
and he was ignorant of the thickness of Mrs. Lloyd Avalons's skin.

"Both, I should say from the make-up of your recital, Mrs. Avalons.
Society and art both spelled themselves with capital letters, that
night."

"I am sure it is very kind of you to say so," she answered, while her
pleasure brought the first sincere note into her voice. "I tried to have
something really good. But about this concert; we are to have a soprano
from the Metropolitan Opera House, and possibly a violinist, and we want
Mr. Thayer so much. Do you suppose we could get him?"

"It might depend a little upon the state of your finances," Bobby
suggested.

"Oh; but it is for charity, you know."

"Yes, charity is supposed to be like molasses, sweet and cheap. It isn't
very nourishing to a professional man, though."

"But Mr. Thayer is not poor."

"That doesn't signify that he can give all his time for nothing," Bobby
answered rather warmly, considering that the question was utterly
impersonal. "If he sang every day, all winter, for some charity or
other, he couldn't begin to get round in ten years. There ought to be a
new mission started, a Society for the Protection of Over-begged
Artists."

"But I am only asking him for one charity."

"That's all anybody is supposed to do. The time hasn't come yet when you
syndicate the job, though I suppose it is only a matter of time."

Mrs. Lloyd Avalons looked at him distrustfully for a moment; then she
laughed with a dainty vagueness.

"You are