woman found food for thought, and the next time they were together
dazzled him with her princes and cardinals and personal little anecdotes
of courts and kings. She also showed him dainty missives, superscribed,
"My dear Loraine," and ended "Most affectionately yours," and signed by
the given name of a real live queen on a throne. And he marvelled in his
heart that the great woman should deign to waste so much as a moment upon
him. But she played him cleverly, making flattering contrasts and
comparisons between him and the noble phantoms she drew mainly from her
fancy, till he went away dizzy with self-delight and sorrowing for the
world which had been denied him so long. Freda was a more masterful
woman. If she flattered, no one knew it. Should she stoop, the stoop
were unobserved. If a man felt she thought well of him, so subtly was
the feeling conveyed that he could not for the life of him say why or
how. So she tightened her grip upon Floyd Vanderlip and rode daily
behind his dogs.

And just here is where the mistake occurred. The buzz rose loudly and
more definitely, coupled now with the name of the dancer, and Mrs.
Eppingwell heard. She, too, thought of Flossie lifting her moccasined
feet through the endless hours, and Floyd Vanderlip was invited up the
hillside to tea, and invited often. This quite took his breath away, and
he became drunken with appreciation of himself. Never was man so
maltreated. His soul had become a thing for which three women struggled,
while a fourth was on the way to claim it. And three such women!

But Mrs. Eppingwell and the mistake she made. She spoke of the affair,
tentatively, to Sitka Charley, who had sold dogs to the Greek girl. But
no names were mentioned. The nearest approach to it was when Mrs.
Eppingwell said, "This--er--horrid woman," and Sitka Charley, with the
model-woman strong in his thoughts, had echoed, "--er--horrid woman." And
he agreed with her, that it was a wicked thing for a woman to come
between a man and the girl he was to marry. "A mere girl, Charley," she
said, "I am sure she is. And she is coming into a strange country
without a friend when she gets here. We must do something." Sitka
Charley promised his help, and went away thinking what a wicked woman
this Loraine Lisznayi must be, also what noble women Mrs. Eppingwell and
Freda were to interest themselves in the welfare of the unknown Flossie.

Now Mrs. Eppingwell was open as the day.