s scientifically shut, and my heart beatifically
open." She hesitated. "I--I was going to swing my life, and my
undertakings--right." It became increasingly hard for her to
speak, and a little gasp went round the table. "I've--I've made
nothing--nothing but mistakes," she finished piteously.

"But you've rectified them," Betty put in vigorously. "Nancy, dear,
I've never known you to make a mistake that you haven't rectified, and
that is more than I can say of any other person in the world."

"Sirloin and carrots," Caroline said, as the next course came in.
"I'll wager you've cut the price of this dinner in two by judicious
ordering."

"There's nothing else but field salad," Nancy said, still piteously,
"and raspberry _mousse_."

"Nancy, you'll break my heart," Betty said, wiping her eyes frankly,
but Nancy only looked at her wonderingly, wistfully, preoccupied and
remote, while Preston Eustace gazed at Betty as if he too would find a
welcome relief in shedding a heavy tear or two.

"Collier Pratt has broken her heart, Dick," Betty told him in the
limousine on the way home. "It's been going on ever since the first
time she saw him. Down at the restaurant we've all known it. She's
been eating at his table every night for months, and Gaspard and
everybody else in the place, in fact, has been a slave to his lightest
whim. I've always disliked him intensely, myself."

"Why didn't you tell me before, Betty?"

"It wasn't my business to tell you. I thought it was coming off, you
know."

"What was coming off?"

"Their affair. I thought it was past my meddling."

"Do you mean to say that you thought Nancy was going to marry Collier
Pratt--_Nancy_?"

"Why, yes, if I hadn't I--I wouldn't have acted up the way I did in
your rooms that night."

But Dick neither heard nor understood her.

"Do you mean to say that you think Collier Pratt has been making love
to her?"

"I think so."

"But the damned scoundrel is married."

"Oh!" Betty cried. "_Oh!_--I didn't know that."

"I've known it--I've always known it," Dick said. "I never dreamed
that Nancy had any special interest in him."

"Well, she had. She's going through everything, Dick, even Sheila--you
know how she loved Sheila?"

"I know," Dick said grimly. "Do you mind going on home alone, Betty?
You'll be perfectly safe with Williams, you know."

"Of course not. What are you going to do, Dick? Are you going to
Nancy?"

"No, I'm not going to Nancy."

Bet