"

"Her husband? But she's an American--she's divorced," the Duchess
replied, as if she were merely stating the same fact in two different
ways; and Undine stopped short with a pang of apprehension.

The Princess came up behind her. "Who's the solemn person with Mamma?
Ah, that old bore of a Trezac!" She dropped her long eye-glass with a
laugh. "Well, she'll be useful--she'll stick to Mamma like a leech and
we shall get away oftener. Come, let's go and be charming to her."

She approached Madame de Trezac effusively, and after an interchange of
exclamations Undine heard her say "You know my friend Mrs. Marvell? No?
How odd! Where do you manage to hide yourself, chere Madame? Undine,
here's a compatriot who hasn't the pleasure--"

"I'm such a hermit, dear Mrs. Marvell--the Princess shows me what I
miss," the Marquise de Trezac murmured, rising to give her hand
to Undine, and speaking in a voice so different from that of the
supercilious Miss Wincher that only her facial angle and the droop of
her nose linked her to the hated vision of Potash Springs.

Undine felt herself dancing on a flood-tide of security. For the first
time the memory of Potash Springs became a thing to smile at, and with
the Princess's arm through hers she shone back triumphantly on Madame de
Trezac, who seemed to have grown suddenly obsequious and insignificant,
as though the waving of the Princess's wand had stripped her of all her
false advantages.

But upstairs, in her own room. Undine's courage fell. Madame de Trezac
had been civil, effusive even, because for the moment she had been taken
off her guard by finding Mrs. Marvell on terms of intimacy with the
Princess Estradina and her mother. But the force of facts would reassert
itself. Far from continuing to see Undine through her French friends'
eyes she would probably invite them to view her compatriot through the
searching lens of her own ampler information. "The old hypocrite--she'll
tell them everything," Undine murmured, wincing at the recollection
of the dentist's assistant from Deposit, and staring miserably at her
reflection in the dressing-table mirror. Of what use were youth and
grace and good looks, if one drop of poison distilled from the envy of
a narrow-minded woman was enough to paralyze them? Of course Madame de
Trezac knew and remembered, and, secure in her own impregnable position,
would never rest till she had driven out the intruder.

XXVIII

"What do you say to N