ent. But you've been as cool as a fish--I've been
watching you. You might have been brought up in a vice-regal lodge and
hobnobbed all your life with ambassadors. How do you do it?"

Joan laughed and threw out her arms. "Oh, I don't know," she said, with
her eyes dancing and her nostrils extended. "I don't stop to think how
to do things. I just do them. These people are young and alive, and
it's good to be among them. I work off some of my own vitality on them
and get recharged at the sound of their chatter. People, people--give
me people and the clash of tongues and the sense of movement. I don't
much care who they are. I shall pick up all the little snobbish stuff
sooner or later, of course, and talk about the right set and all that,
as you do. I'm bound to. At present everything's new and exciting, and
I'm whipping it up. You wait a little. I'll cut out some of the dull
and pompous when I've got things going, and limit myself to red-blooded
speed-breakers. Give me time, Alice."

She sat down at the piano and crashed out a fox-trot that was all over
town. No one would have imagined from her freshness and vivacity that
she had been dancing until daylight every night that week.

"Well," said Alice when she could be heard, "I see you making history,
my dear; there's no doubt about that."

"None whatever," answered Joan. "I'm outside the walls at last, and
I'll go the pace until the ambulance comes."

"With or without Martin Gray?"

"With, if he's quick enough--without, if not."

"Be careful," said Alice.

"Not I, my dear. I left care away back in the country with my little
old frocks."

Alice held out her hand. "You bewilder me a little," she said. "You
make me feel as if I were in a high wind. You did when we were at
school, I remember. Well, don't bother to thank me for having got up
this party." She added this a little dryly.

With a most winning smile Joan kissed her. "You're a good pal, Alice,"
she said, "and I'm very grateful."

Alice was compensated, although her shrewd knowledge of character told
her how easily her friend won her points. "And I hope you're duly
grateful to Martin Gray?"

"To dear old Marty? Rather! He and I are great pals."

But that was all Alice got. Her burning curiosity to know precisely how
this young couple stood must go unsatisfied for the time being. She had
only caught a few fleeting glimpses of the man who had given Joan the
key to life, and every time had wondered, from