e
even stretched away into the farther room, where, under brilliantly
lighted side brackets, a young girl sat playing at the piano, a
glass of champagne, gone flat, at her dimpled elbow. Another girl,
in a shrimp-pink evening gown, one silken knee drooping over the
other, lay half buried among the cushions, singing the air which
the player at the piano picked out by ear. A third girl,
velvet-eyed and dark of hair, listened pensively, turning the gems
on her fingers.

The pretty musician at the piano was playing an old song, once much
admired by the sentimental; the singer, reclining amid her
cushions, sang the words, absently:

"Why did I give my heart away--
Give it so lightly, give it to pay
For a pleasant dream on a summer's day?

"Why did I give? I do not know.
Surely the passing years will show.

"Why did I give my love away--
Give it in April, give it in May,
For a young man's smile on a summer's day?

"Why did I love? I do not know.
Perhaps the passing years will show.

"Why did I give my soul away--
Give it so gaily, give it to pay
For a sigh and a kiss on a summer's day?

"Perhaps the passing years may show;
My heart and I, we do not know."

She broke off short, swung on the revolving chair, and called: "Mr.
Berkley, _are_ you going to see me home?"

"Last jack, Miss Carew," said Berkley, "I'm opening it for the
limit. Give me one round of fixed ammunition, Arthur."

"There's no use drawing," observed another man, laying down his
hand, "Berkley cleans us up _as_ usual."

He was right; everything went to Berkley, as usual, who laughed and
turned a dissipated face to Casson.

"Cold decks?" he suggested politely. "Your revenge at your
convenience, Jack."

Casson declined. Cortlandt, in his brilliant zouave uniform, stood
up and stretched his arms until the scarlet chevrons on the blue
sleeves wrinkled into jagged lightning.

"It's been very kind of you all to come to my last 'good-bye
party,'" he yawned, looking sleepily around him through the smoke
at his belongings.

For a week he had been giving a "good-bye party" every evening in
his handsome house on Twenty-third Street. The four men and the
three young girls in the other room were the residue of this party,
which was to be the last.

Arthur Wye, wearing the brand-new uniform, red stripes and facings,
of flying artillery, rose also; John Casson buttoned his cavalry
jacket, grumbling, and stood