tractive to men and to find pleasure in
her attractiveness. It was a pleasure that raised its head timidly,
apologetically; but it raised it none the less.

It was a new and terrifying thought that Chip might not always be the
only man in her life. She had dedicated herself to him so entirely that
it was difficult to accept the idea that any part of her might have been
held in reserve for future possibilities. That her life should have been
blasted was bad enough; but that it should renew its vigor and put forth
shoots for a second bloom was frightful. Yet there was the fact that
such things happened. Women in her position even married again. _She_
might marry again. She never would--of course! But remarriage was among
the potentialities of the new conditions she had achieved. The full
comprehension of this liberty filled her with dismay.

Up to the present the knowledge that she possessed it had been theoretic
only. The young Frenchman brought home to her the fact that she could
act on it if she were ever so inclined. Not that he asked her to do so.
He had only reached the point of inviting her to dine with him at Monte
Carlo and look in at the gaming afterward. She declined this invitation
gently and without rancor toward him; but, in the idiom she used in
talking with him, it gave her to think.

It gave her to realize also. The moment was rich in revelations
concerning herself. She discovered she was a woman whom a relatively
strange man might invite to dine with him alone. She had passed out of
the fellowship of Hagar and Hecuba to enter that of Mrs. G. Cottle
Scadding. This had happened, she hardly knew how. She discovered,
moreover, that now that it had happened, she was scarcely shocked.
Somehow it seemed in the nature of things--these curious new things she
had created for herself--that she should be invited in this way to
Ciro's and that there might be similar incidents to follow. She
certainly was not shocked. Deep down in her heart something--was it
something feminine? or was it something broadly human?--was secretly
shamefully flattered. She couldn't blame the young fellow. She couldn't
blame Gertie--very much. She might blame herself for being drawn into
Gertie's company, and yet what other course could she have taken? She
had known Gertie since they were school-girls. When all was said and
done Gertie was as good as she--in whatever met the eye. One divorced
woman could hardly draw her skirts away from a