miled pleasantly, though she felt the strongest repulsion
for the man.

'I happened to be on the stage,' she said modestly. 'Any of the others
would have done the same.'

'Well,' drawled Mr. Feist, 'may be. I doubt it.'

Dinner was announced.

'Will you keep house for me?' asked the Ambassador of Lady Maud.

'There's something rather appropriate about your playing Ambassadress
here,' observed Logotheti.

Margaret heard but did not understand that her new acquaintance was
a Russian subject. Mustapha Pasha held out his arm to take her in to
dinner. The spectacled peer took in Lady Maud, and the men straggled
in. At table Lady Maud sat opposite the Pasha, with the peer on her
right and the barrister on her left. Margaret was on the right of the
Ambassador, on whose other side Griggs was placed, and Logotheti
was Margaret's other neighbour. Feist and the young playwright were
together, between Griggs and the nobleman.

Margaret glanced round the table at the people and wondered about
them. She had heard of the barrister and the novelist, and the peer's
name had a familiar sound that suggested something unusual, though she
could not quite remember what it was. It might be pictures, or the
north pole, or the divorce court, or a new idiot asylum; it would
never matter much. The new acquaintances on whom her attention fixed
itself were Lady Maud, who attracted her strongly, and Mr. Feist,
who repelled her. She wished she could speak Greek in order to ask
Logotheti who the latter was and why he was present. To judge by
appearances he was probably a rich young American who travelled and
frequented theatres a good deal, and who wished to be able to say
that he knew Cordova. He had perhaps arrived lately with a letter
of introduction to the Ambassador, who had asked him to the first
nondescript informal dinner he gave, because the man would not have
fitted in anywhere else.

Logotheti began to talk at once, while Mustapha Pasha plunged into a
political conversation with Griggs.

'I'm much more glad to see you than you can imagine,' the Greek said,
not in an undertone, but just so softly that no one else could hear
him.

'I'm not good at imagining,' answered Margaret. 'But I'm glad you are
here. There are so many new faces.'

'Happily you are not shy. One of your most enviable qualities is your
self-possession.'

'You're not lacking in that way either,' laughed Margaret. 'Unless you
have changed very much.'

'Neit