"Tell me frankly if there’s the least thing. I must be very nice to-day. We’re giving a lunch to a young English woman, a tennis champion, and I’m on the reception committee. Do I _really_ look nice?" "Yes," said Angelica, in a still more doubtful tone. "You don’t think so!" cried Mrs. Russell. "I can see that! But, my dear, I don’t suppose a woman of my age ever can look very nice." However, the glance she gave to her reflection in the mirror was quite a complacent one. She began covering her face with pink powder, while she talked; and grimacing as she carefully avoided the blackened eyebrows. "How did you get on with Mrs. Geraldine?" she asked. "All right; she’s not so bad," said Angelica. "Only sort of dopey." "‘Dopey’? What’s that?" Angelica flushed. "Oh, like people that take dope--morphine and opium and all that." "But my _dear_ girl, Polly doesn’t----” "I _know_. I only said she acted like people that do. It’s just a word people use about any one that’s quiet and----” "Mrs. Geraldine’s very reserved--quite different from me. I’m obliged to say everything that comes into my head. But I dare say her life has made her like that." "Why has it? What kind of life has she had?" asked Angelica, with naked curiosity. "My dear, you see, she was married before to a perfectly dreadful sort of man. He drank, and I don’t know what else--absolutely no good at all. You see, she used to be a concert singer when she was young. It’s very interesting to hear her tell about her days in Germany, when she studied there. And then she came back to New York and got an engagement to sing in one of the first-class restaurants. She really comes from a _nice_ family--Ohio people--not in society at all, but _nice_. They weren’t at all well off, so I suppose they were glad to have her earning her own living. Anyway, they were away off in Ohio, so they couldn’t have stopped her very well, could they?" "No," said Angelica, astounded at the very idea of the melancholy Mrs. Geraldine singing in a restaurant. "She must have been quite a pretty girl," Mrs. Russell went on. "I’ve seen pictures of her. She says she had the most distressing experiences with men, following her, and so on. She says she was really just about to give up the restaurant singing when one night this tremendously handsome man was waiting for her when she came out. She says he was so different from the usual sort--so gentlemanly, and so on; and _he’d_ been so impressed with _her_. My dear, have I too much powder on?" "Yes, on your forehead. Who was this feller--the handsome one?" Mrs. Russell stared at her in perplexity. Then she suddenly recollected the subject of their talk.