Clancy's jaw dropped in dismay. Even including the change from the five-dollar bill that Grannis had left upon the table—she suddenly realized that she hadn't sent Grannis this money—she had only about seven dollars. Then her face brightened. She had convinced herself that on the morrow it would be perfectly safe to withdraw some of the funds that stood in the Thespian Bank to the credit of Florine Ladue.
And, anyway, it would have been poor economy to ruin the only pair of slippers fit for evening wear that she owned to save a taxi-fare. The snow was swirling through the street as Clancy ran down the steps to the waiting taxi-cab. It was, though she didn't know it, the beginning of a blizzard that was to give the winter of Nineteen-twenty a special prominence. In the cab Clancy wondered if the snow that had fallen upon her hair would melt and disarrange her coiffure. And when Mrs. Carey opened the door herself on Clancy's arrival at the studio-house in Waverly Place, she noticed the girl's hands patting the black mass and laughed.
"Don't bother about it, my dear," she advised. "I want to fix it for you myself after dinner."
She took Clancy's coat from her and hung it in a closet.
"Usually," she said, "I have a maid to attend to these things, but this is Thursday, and she's off for the day."
Clancy suddenly remembered Mrs. Carey's talk of the morning.
"But your cook——"
Mrs. Carey shrugged. They were shoulders well worth shrugging. And the blue gown that her hostess wore this evening revealed even more than the black gown of the Trevor last night.
"Still sick," laughed Mrs. Carey. "That's why I'm giving a party. I like to prove that I'm not dependent on my servants. And I'm not. Of course"—and she chuckled—"I'm dependent upon caterers and that sort of thing, but still—I deceive myself into thinking I'm independent. Self-deception is God's kindest gift to humanity."
She was even more beautiful than last night, Clancy thought. Then she felt a sudden sinking of the heart. If Sophie Carey, with her genius, her fame, her savoir-faire, her beauty, wanted David Randall— She shook her head in angry self-rebuke as she followed Mrs. Carey to the tiny dining-room.