Davidge could not even recover the foot he had put in it. By looking foolish and keeping silent he barely saved himself from adding the other foot. Mrs. Prothero smiled at his discomfiture.
“Don’t worry. I’m too ancient to be caught by pretty speeches––or to like the men who have ’em always ready.”
She pressed his hand again and turned to welcome the financial Cyclops, James Dyckman, and his huge wife, and Captain Fargeton, a foreign military attaché with service chevrons and wound-chevrons and a croix de guerre, and a wife, who had been Mildred Tait.
“All that and an American spouse!” said Davidge to Marie Louise.
“Have you never had an American spouse?” she asked, brazenly.
“Not one!” he confessed.
Major and Polly Widdicombe had come in with Marie Louise, and Davidge drifted into their circle. The great room filled gradually with men of past or future fame, and the poor women who were concerned in enduring its acquisition.
Marie Louise was radiant in mood and queenly in attire. Davidge was startled by the magnificence of her jewelry. Some of it was of old workmanship, royal heirloomry. Her accent was decidedly English, yet her race was undoubtedly American. The many things about her that had puzzled him subconsciously began to clamor at least for the attention of curiosity. He watched her making the best of herself, as a skilful woman does when she is all dressed up in handsome scenery among toplofty people.
Polly was describing the guests as they came in:
“That’s Colonel Harvey Forbes. His name has been sent to Congress for approval as a brigadier-general. I knew him in the midst of the wildest scandal––remind me to tell you. 124 He was only a captain then. He’ll probably end as a king or something. This war is certainly good to some people.”