"I will of course," Rose answered. "Have I got to be agreeable to any mothers or aunts she may have lurking in the background?"

"That's the trouble. She hasn't got a soul."

"Oh! And she is quite young?"

"Sometimes she looks a baby. Sometimes I think she's a little older."

"Then she probably is. Where's she staying?"

"At the Hôtel de Paris."

"My gracious! Alone at a big Monte Carlo hotel! A young girl! No wonder you glare out of the window while you ask me to call on her, and stick your hands deep in your pockets. People won't allow me for an instant to forget I'm a clergyman's wife. Et tu Brute!"

"I told you she was a lady." Dick turned rather white. "She doesn't know what she's doing. I'm sure she doesn't. She—even Schuyler, who reads most people at sight like A B C, can't make her out. She's a mystery."

"Forgive me," said Rose. "I was half in fun. I wouldn't hurt your Flying-Fish feelings for anything on earth or in air. Is she pretty, and is she American—or what?"

"She's perfectly beautiful, and she's English, I think."