He made his exit in a manner to be admired. Mrs. Croydon feigned to shrink aside as he passed her, but Mrs. Neligage looked at her with so open a laugh at this performance that confusion overcame the dame of bugles, and she moved forward disconcerted. She had not yet gained a seat, when Miss Wentstile faced her with all her most unrestrained fashion.
"I shouldn't think, Mrs. Croydon, that you, with the stain of a divorce court on you, were in position to throw stones at Count Shimbowski. He has done nothing but follow the customs to which he's been brought up."
"Perhaps that's true of Mrs. Croydon too," murmured Mrs. Neligage to Alice.
"If you wanted to tell me," Miss Wentstile went on, "why didn't you tell me when he was not here? No wonder foreigners think we are barbarians when a nobleman is insulted like that."
"I didn't mean to tell you," Mrs. Croydon stammered humbly. "It just came out."
"Why didn't you mean to tell me?" demanded Miss Wentstile, whose anger had evidently deprived her for the time being of all coolness.
"Why, I thought you were engaged to him!" blurted out Mrs. Croydon, fairly crimson from brow to chin.
"Engaged!" echoed Miss Wentstile, half breathless with indignation.
Mrs. Neligage came to the rescue, cool and collected, entirely mistress of herself and of the situation.
"Really, Mrs. Croydon," she suggested, smiling, "don't you think that is bringing Western brusqueness home to us in rather a startling way? We don't speak of engagements until they are announced, you know."