“No, I thank you,” said he, and then wondered if perhaps he should not have said yes, as he watched the other select the largest of the half-dozen wine-glasses clustered at her place, and pour herself out a generous libation.
“Have you seen much of the city?” she asked, as she tossed it off—without as much as a quiver of an eyelash.
“No,” said he. “They have not given me much time. They took me off to the country—to the Robert Wallings’.”
“Ah,” said Mrs. Alden; and Montague, struggling to make conversation, inquired, “Do you know Mr. Walling?”
“Quite well,” said the other, placidly. “I used to be a Walling myself, you know.”
“Oh,” said Montague, taken aback; and then added, “Before you were married?”
“No,” said Mrs. Alden, more placidly than ever, “before I was divorced.”
There was a dead silence, and Montague sat gasping to catch his breath. Then suddenly he heard a faint subdued chuckle, which grew into open laughter; and he stole a glance at Mrs. Alden, and saw that her eyes were twinkling; and then he began to laugh himself. They laughed together, so merrily that others at the table began to look at them in perplexity.
So the ice was broken between them; which filled Montague with a vast relief. But he was still dimly touched with awe—for he realized that this must be the great Mrs. Billy Alden, whose engagement to the Duke of London was now the topic of the whole country. And that huge diamond ornament must be part of Mrs. Alden’s million-dollar outfit of jewellery!
The great lady volunteered not to tell on him; and added generously that when he came to dinner with her she would post him concerning the company. “It’s awkward for a stranger, I can understand,” said she; and continued, grimly: “When people get divorces it sometimes means that they have quarrelled—and they don’t always make it up afterward, either. And sometimes other people quarrel—almost as bitterly as if they had been married. Many a hostess has had her reputation ruined by not keeping track of such things.”