of a subtle undercurrent.

"And I've another unexpected guest," she added to Diane. "Carl's here.
Wandering in from Heaven knows where, as he always does. He's making
his peace with your aunt--"

Herodotus, who had been trying for some time to get into friendly
communication with his lady, suddenly murmured "Frost in Florida!" with
audible regret and moved off good-humoredly to look for Carl.

He found that young man listening attentively to his aunt's reproaches.

"And that costume, Carl," fluttered Queen Elizabeth in aggrieved
disapproval. "Why, dear me, it's enough to make a body shudder, it's
so sort of sinister--it is indeed! And I do hope you don't set your
hair on fire with that extraordinary light in your turban. Is it a
candle or an electric bulb?"

"A forty horse power glowworm!" Carl assured her gravely, and the
portly Jethro sniggered to the danger of his seams.

Philip's hand came down heavily upon the Palmer's broad shoulder and
Carl wheeled. In that instant as he grasped Philip's hand in a silence
more eloquent than words, every finer instinct of his queerly balanced
nature flashed in his face. The two hands tightened and fell apart.

"Come, smoke!" invited Carl, smiling. "I'm glad you're here. I
haven't been ragged and abused for so long there's a lonely furrow in
my soul."

But Dick Sherrill, looking very warm and disgruntled in a costume he
informed them bitterly was meant for Claude Duval, came up as they were
turning away and insisted upon presenting Carl to the guest of the
evening.

"Ann sent me," he added. "And you've got to come. And I want to say
right now that Ann makes me tired. She's as notional as a lunatic.
_She_ planned this rig and now she doesn't like it. And if I don't
look like a highwayman you can wager your last sou I feel like one, and
that's sufficient. The whole trouble is that Ann's been so busy with
hair-dressers and manicurists and _corsetieres_ and dressmakers and the
Lord knows what not over that stunning Indian girl, who'll likely run
off with the family topazes, that she's had no time for her brother,
and rubs it in now by laughing at the shape of my legs. What's the
matter with my legs, Carl?"

"Too ornamental," said Carl. "Curvilinear grace is all very well but--"

"Shut up!" said Sherrill viciously. "Have you ever met this king-pin
I'm exploiting?"

"I've seen him," said Car. "Once when he was riding up the mountain
road to Houdania with