"Come," he said, "this is an excellent start. You are to play the Circe
up to date, and I am to be beguiled. How ought I to answer you? I do
remember the Ambassador's, and I do remember driving down the Bois in
your victoria, and holding--I believe I am right--your hand. You have no
right to disturb those charming memories by attempting to turn them into
bathos."

She blew out a little cloud of tobacco smoke, and watched it
thoughtfully.

"Ah!" she remarked. "I wonder who is better at that, you or I? I may not
be exactly a sentimental person, but you--you are a flint."

"On the contrary," Mr. Sabin assured her earnestly, "I am very much in
love with my wife."

"Dear me!" she exclaimed. "You carry originality to quixoticism. I have
met several men before in my life whom I have suspected of such a thing,
but I never heard any one confess it. This little domestic contretemps
is then, I presume, disagreeable to you!"

"To the last degree," Mr. Sabin asserted. "So much so that I leave for
England by the Campania."

She shook her head slowly.

"I wouldn't if I were you."

"Why not?"

Lady Carey threw away the end of her cigarette, and looked for a moment
thoughtfully at her long white fingers glittering with rings. Then she
began to draw on her gloves.

"Well, in the first place," she said, "Lucille will have no time
to spare for you. You will be de trop in decidedly an uncomfortable
position. You wouldn't find London at all a good place to live in just
now, even if you ever got there--which I am inclined to doubt. And
secondly, here am I--"

"Circe!" he murmured.

"Waiting to be entertained, in a strange country, almost friendless.
I want to be shown everything, taken everywhere. And I am dying to see
your home at Lenox. I do not think your attitude towards me in the least
hospitable."

"Come, you are judging me very quickly," he declared. "What
opportunities have I had?"

"What opportunities can there be if you sail by the Campania?"

"You might dine with me to-night at least."

"Impossible! The Dalkeiths have a party to meet me. Come too, won't you?
They love dukes--even French ones."

He shook his head.

"There is no attraction for me in a large party," he answered. "I am
getting to an age when to make conversation in return for a dinner seems
scarcely a fair exchange."

"From your host's point of view, or yours?"

"From both! Besides, one's digestion suffers."

"You are certainly getting