"I am afraid I am, Carlotta," she admitted. "It is rather a mess, isn't it?"
Carlotta groaned and dropping into a chaise lounge encircled her knees with her arms, staring with troubled eyes at her guest.
"A mess? I should say it was—worse than a mess—a catastrophe. You know what Alan is—isn't—" She floundered off into silence.
"Oh, yes," said Tony, the more tranquil of the two. "I know what he is and isn't, better than most people, I think. I ought to. But I love him. I just discovered it to-night, or rather it is the first time I ever let myself look straight at the fact. I think I have known it from the beginning."
"But Tony! You won't marry him. You can't. Your people will never let you. They oughtn't to let you."
Tony shook back her wavy mane of hair, sent it billowing over her rose-colored satin kimono.
"It don't matter if the whole world won't let me. If I decide to marry
Alan I shall do it."
"Tony!"
There was shocked consternation in Carlotta's tone and Tony relenting burst into a low, tremulous little laugh.
"Don't worry, Carlotta. I'm not so mad as I sound. I told Alan he would have to wait a year. He has to prove to me he is—worth loving."