hidden their own
self-pity under the excuse of the necessity of being kind to her.

She was to lunch out with a few critical contemporaries. She was
horrified when she looked at herself by morning light. Her skin had an
ivory hue, and there were many fine wrinkles about her eyes. She began to
repair these damages with the utmost frankness, talking meantime to
Mathilde and the maid. She swept her whole face with a white lotion,
rouged lightly, but to her very eyelids, touched a red pencil to her
lips, all with discretion. The result was satisfactory. The improvement
in her appearance made her feel braver. She couldn't have faced these
people--she did not know whether to think of them as intimate enemies or
hostile friends--if she had been looking anything but her best.

But they were just what she needed; they would be hard and amusing and
keep her at some tension. She thought rather crossly that she could not
sit through a meal at home and listen to Mathilde rambling on about love
and Mr. Farron.

She was inexcusably late, and they had sat down to luncheon--three men
and two women--by the time she arrived. They had all been, or had wanted
to go, to an auction sale of _objets d'art_ that had taken place the
night before. They were discussing it, praising their own purchases, and
decrying the value of everybody else's when Adelaide came in.

"Oh, Adelaide," said her hostess, "we were just wondering what you paid
originally for your tapestry."

"The one in the hall?"

"No, the one with the Turk in it."

"I haven't an idea,--" Adelaide was distinctly languid,--"I got it from
my grandfather."

"Wouldn't you know she'd say that?" exclaimed one of the women. "Not that
I deny it's true; only, you know, Adelaide, whenever you do want to throw
a veil over one of your pieces, you always call on the prestige of your
ancestors."

Adelaide raised her eyebrows.

"Really," she answered, "there isn't anything so very conspicuous about
having had a grandfather."

"No," her hostess echoed, "even I, so well and favorably known for my
vulgarity--even _I_ had a grandfather."

"But he wasn't a connoisseur in tapestries, Minnie darling."

"No, but he was in pigs, the dear vulgarian."

"True vulgarity," said one of the men, "vulgarity in the best sense, I
mean, should betray no consciousness of its own existence. Only thus can
it be really great."

"Oh, Minnie's vulgarity is just artificial, assumed because she found it
wor