Running her finger along the painted faces, she let it rest upon a gorgeous blonde with Titian hair and a glassy eye and smile. “Who’s that?” she queried, with a mocking air.
For a moment he looked incredulous.
“Not—not Anne?” he begged. The ghastly similitude smote ludicrously.
“You have said it. Isn’t she dazzling, like a Pepsodent advertisement, or the ‘only one out of five’ who escaped pyorrhea?” Ellen laughed loudly.
“It’s blasphemy, pure and simple! And neither simple nor pure. Your artist ought to be hung for libel.”
They went to the table and he seated her. It was one of those narrow, casket-like affairs with large candles at the head and foot and an artificial spray of diseased-looking orchids sprawling over the center.
The Chinese girl, supplemented by an equally-gorgeous twin, passed hors d’œuvres. He helped himself to truffles in aspic and caught Ellen’s gaze resting upon him maliciously from the other end of the table.
“Where did you and Anne go last night?” she flashed.
He returned her stare blankly. “Why, nowhere, of course,” he replied. “Why do you ask?”
Ellen’s eyes glowed in the candle-light. “You needn’t expect me to believe that! Gerald and I knew you were up to something. But it was a dirty trick to desert us like that at the last minute! The evening was a mess.”