Mrs. Isadore Meyerburg pushed her real-lace bodice into place and adjusted the glittering lizard. "Believe me," she said, exuding a sigh and patting her bosom on the swell of that deep breath, "I ate too much, but if I can't break my diet for the last engagement in the family, and to nobility at that, when will I do it?" "I should say so," replied Mrs. Rudolph Meyerburg, herself squirming to rights in an elaborate bodice and wielding an unostentatious toothpick behind the cup of her hand; "like I told Roody just now, if I take on a pound to-day he can blame his sister." "Say, I wish you'd look at the marquis kissing ma's hand again, will you?" "Look at ma get away with it too. You've got to hand it to them French, they've got the manners all right. No wonder our swell Trixie tags after them." "Say, Becky shouldn't get manners yet with her looks and five hundred thousand thrown in. I bet, if the truth is known, and since ma is going to live over there with them, that there's a few extra thousand tacked on too." "Not if the court knows it! Like I told Roody this morning, she's bringing a title into the family, but she's taking a big wad of the Meyerburg money out of the country too." "It is so, ain't it?" Around her crowded Mrs. Meyerburg's five sons. "Come with us, ma. We got a children's party up in the ballroom for Aileen this afternoon, and then Trixie and I are going to motor down to Sheepshead for the indoor polo-match. Come, ma." "No, no, Felix. I want for myself rest this afternoon. All you children go and have your good times. I got home more as I can do, and maybe company, too." "Tell you what, ma, come with Dora and me and the kids. She wants to go out to Hastings this afternoon to see her mother. Come with us, ma. The drive will do you good." "No, no, Izzy. When I ride too much in the cold right away up in my ribs comes the sciatica again." Miss Meyerburg bent radiant over her parent. "Mother," she whispered, her throat lined with the fur of tenderness, "it's reception-day out at that club, and all the cliques will be there, and I want--" "Sure, Becky, you and the marquis should drive out. Take the big car, but tell James he shouldn't be so careless driving by them curves out there by the golf-links." "But, ma dear, you come, too, and--" "No, no, Becky; to-day I got not time." "But, ma--ma, you ain't mad at me, dear? You can see now for yourself, can't you, dear, what a big thing it is for the family and how you--" "Yes, yes, Becky. Look, go over by your young man. See how he stands there and not one word what Ben is hollering so at him can he understand." Across the room, alongside a buffet wrought out of the powerful Jacobean period, Mr. Ben Meyerburg threw a violent contortion. "Want to go up in the Turkish room and smoke?" he shouted, the apoplectic purple of exertion rushing into his face and round to the roll of flesh overhanging the rear of his collar. _"Pardon?"_