waltz. Naida's head moved to the music, and
presently Nigel rose to his feet with a smile, and they passed into the
ballroom. Karschoff and Mrs. Bollington Smith watched them with
interest.

"Naida is looking very wonderful to-night," the latter remarked. "And
Nigel, too; I wonder if there is anything between them."

"The days of foreign alliances are past," Karschoff replied, "but a few
intermarriages might be very good for this country."

"Are you serious?" she asked.

"Absolutely! I would not suggest anything of the sort with Germany, but
with this new Russia, the Russia of which Naida Karetsky is a daughter,
why not? Although they will not have me back there, Russia is some day
going to lay down the law to Europe."

"I wonder whether Maggie has any ideas of the sort in her mind," Mrs.
Bollington Smith observed. "She seems curiously abstracted to-night."

Chalmers came grumblingly up to Mrs. Bollington Smith, with whom he was
an established favourite.

"Lady Maggie is treating me disgracefully," he complained. "She will
scarcely dance at all. She goes around talking to every one as though it
were a sort of farewell party."

"Perhaps it may be," Karschoff remarked quietly.

"She isn't going away, is she?" Chalmers demanded.

"Who knows?" the Prince replied. "Lady Maggie is one of those strange
people to whom one may look with every confidence for the unexpected."

She herself came across to them, a few moments later.

"Something tells me," she declared, "that you are talking about me."

"You are always a very much discussed young lady," Karschoff rejoined,
with a little bow.

She made a grimace and sank into a chair by her aunt. She talked on
lightly enough, but all the time with that slight suggestion of
superficiality which is a sign of strain. She glanced often towards the
entrance of the lounge, yet no one seemed less disturbed when at a few
minutes before eleven Prince Shan came quietly in. He made his way at
once to Mrs. Bollington Smith and bent over her fingers.

"It is so kind of you and Lord Dorminster," he said, "to give me this
opportunity of saying good-by to a few friends."

"You are leaving us so soon, Prince?"

"To-morrow, soon after dawn," he replied, his eyes wandering around the
little circle. "I wish to be in Pekin, if possible, by Wednesday, so my
_Dragon_ must spread his wings indeed."

He said a few words to almost everybody. Last of all he came to Maggie,
and no one heard