The duchess turned away.
"It's wrong of me to discourage you like that," she said. "Marrying into the peerage is something, after all. You must come home every year—insist on it. Johnson—are these the best caviar bowls the hotel can furnish?"
And the Duchess of Lismore, late of Detroit, drifted off into a bitter argument with the humble Johnson.
Miss Meyrick strolled away, out upon a little balcony opening off the dining-room. She stood gazing down at the waving fronds in the courtyard six stories below. If only that fountain down there were Ponce de Leon's! But it wasn't. To-morrow she must put youth behind. She must go far from the country she loved—did she care enough for that? Strangely enough, burning tears filled her eyes. Hot revolt surged into her heart. She stood looking down——
Meanwhile the other members of the dinner-party were gathering with tender solicitude about their hostess in the ballroom beyond. Dick Minot, hopeless, glum, stalked moodily among them. Into the crowd drifted Jack Paddock, his sprightly air noticeably lacking, his eyes worried, dreadful.
"For the love of heaven," Minot asked, as they stepped together into a secluded corner, "what ails you?"
"Be gentle with me, boy," said Paddock unhappily. "I'm in a horrible mess. The graft, Dick—the good old graft. It's over and done with now."
"What do you mean?"
"It happened last night after our wild chase of Harrowby—I was fussed—excited—— I prepared two sets of repartee for my two customers to use to-night——"
"Yes?"