ve?"

I acknowledged my identity, and the lady continued: "I am Mrs.
Fox-Porston. You will have heard of my husband, no doubt, and I daresay
we know a great many of the same People at Home." (This with a
dust-brush glance which swept the Americans out of the field.) "I think
it is a very excellent idea of yours, Sir Ralph, to travel about the
Continent on your motor-car with a few congenial companions, and I have
brought my daughters with me to-day in the hope that we may arrange a
delightful little tour which--"

"Ting-a-ling" at the gate bell robbed us of Mrs. Fox-Porston's remaining
hope, and gave us two more visitors.

Little had I known what the consequences of one small, pink
advertisement would be! Apparently it bade fair to let loose upon us,
not the dogs of war, but the whole floating feminine population of the
French Riviera. Something must be done, and done promptly, to stem the
rising tide of ladies, or the Chalet des Pins and Terry and I with it,
would be swamped.

I looked at Terry, he looked at me, as we rose like mechanical figures
to indicate our hosthood to the new arrivals.

They were Americans; I could tell by their chins. They had no
complexions and no particular age; they wore blue tissue veils, and
little jingling bags on their belts, which showed that they were not
married, because if they had been, their husbands would have ordered the
little jingling bags into limbo, wherever that may be.

"Good-afternoon," said the leading Blue Veil. "I am Miss Carrie Hood
Woodall, the lady lawyer from Hoboken, who had such a nice little
paragraph in _The Riviera Sun_, close to your advertisement; and this is
my chaperone, Mrs. Elizabeth Boat Cully. We're touring Europe, and we
want to take a trip with you in your automobile, if--"

"Unfortunately, ladies," said I, "the services of--er--my car are
already engaged to Mrs. Kidder, of Colorado, and her party. Isn't it so,
Barrymore?"

"Yes," replied Terry stoutly. And that "yes" even if inadvertent, was
equivalent I considered, to sign and seal.

Mrs. Kidder beamed like an understudy for _The Riviera Sun_. Beechy
twinkled demurely, and tossed her plaits over her shoulder. Even Miss
Destrey, the white goddess, deigned to smile, straight at Terry and no
other.

At this moment Felicite appeared with a tray. Whipped cream frothed over
the brow of a brown jug like a white wig on the forehead of a judge;
lettuce showed pale green through filmy sandwiches;