idea as to the individualities of the people defiling before
her; then the passing on into the throng, the eating and drinking and
talking with acquaintances from the Lydford summer colony, of whom
there were naturally a large assortment. Sylvia had a growing sense of
pain, which was becoming acute when across the room she saw Molly,
in a lull of arrivals, look up to her husband and receive from him a
smiling, intimate look of possession. Why, they were _married_! It was
done!

The delicate food in Sylvia's mouth turned to ashes.

Mrs. Marshall-Smith's voice, almost fluttered, almost (for her)
excited, came to her ears: "Sylvia--here is Mr. Page! And he's just
told me the most delightful news, that he's decided to run over to
Paris for a time this fall."

"I hope Miss Marshall will think that Paris will be big enough for all
of us?" asked Austin Page, fixing his remarkably clear eyes on the
girl.

She made a great effort for self-possession. She turned her back on
the receiving-line. She held out her hand cordially. "I hope Paris
will be quite, quite small, so that we shall all see a great deal of
each other," she said warmly.

CHAPTER XXXIV

SYLVIA TELLS THE TRUTH

They left Mrs. Marshall-Smith with a book, seated on a little
yellow-painted iron chair, the fifteen-centime kind, at the top of the
great flight of steps leading down to the wide green expanse of the
Tapis Vert. She was alternately reading Huysmans' highly imaginative
ideas on Gothic cathedrals, and letting her eyes stray up and down the
long facade of the great Louis. Her powers of aesthetic assimilation
seemed to be proof against this extraordinary mixture of impressions.
She had insisted that she would be entirely happy there in the sun,
for an hour at least, especially if she were left in solitude with her
book. On which intimation Sylvia and Page had strolled off to do some
exploring. It was a situation which a month of similar arrangements
had made very familiar to them.

"No, I don't know Versailles very well," he said in answer to her
question, "but I believe the gardens back of the Grand and Petit
Trianon are more interesting than these near the Chateau itself.
The conscientiousness with which they're kept up is not quite so
formidable."

So they walked down the side of the Grand Canal, admiring the rather
pensive beauty of the late November woods, and talking, as was the
proper thing, about the great Louis and his court, and h