When Keith arrived at Mrs. Wickersham's he found the company assembled in her great drawing-room--the usual sort to be found in great drawing-rooms of large new chateau-like mansions in a great and commercial city. "Mr. Keats!" called out the prim servant. They always took this poetical view of his name. Mrs. Wickersham greeted him civilly and solemnly. She had aged much since Keith saw her last, and had also grown quite deaf. Her face showed traces of the desperate struggle she was making to keep up appearances. It was apparent that she had not the least idea who he was; but she shook hands with him much as she might have done at a funeral had he called to pay his respects. Among the late arrivals was Mrs. Wentworth. She was the richest-dressed woman in the room, and her jewels were the finest, but she had an expression on her face, as she entered, which Keith had never seen there. Her head was high, and there was an air of defiance about her which challenged the eye at once. "I don't think I shall speak to her," said a voice near Keith. "Well, I have known her all my life, and until it becomes a public scandal I don't feel authorized to cut her--" The speaker was Mrs. Nailor, who was in her most charitable mood. "Oh, of course, I shall speak to her here, but I mean--I certainly shall not visit her." "You know she has quarrelled with her friend, Mrs. Lancaster? About her husband." This was behind her fan. "Oh, yes. She is to be here to-night. Quite brazen, isn't it? We shall see how they meet. I met a remarkably pretty girl down in the dressing-room," she continued; "one of the guests. She has such pretty manners, too. Really, I thought, from her politeness to me in arranging my dress, she must be one of the maids until Mrs. Wentworth spoke to her. Young girls nowadays are so rude! They take up the mirror the whole time, and never think of letting you see yourself. I wonder who she can be?" "Possibly Mrs. Wentworth's companion. I think she is here. She has to have some one to do the proprieties, you know?" said Mrs. Nailor. "I should think it might be as well," assented the other, with a sniff. "But she would hardly be here!" "She is really her governess, a very ill-bred and rude young person," said Mrs. Nailor. The other sighed. "Society is getting so democratic now, one might say, so mixed, that there is no telling whom one may meet nowadays." "No, indeed," pursued Mrs. Nailor. "I do not at all approve of governesses and such persons being invited out. I think the English way much the better. There the governess never dreams of coming to the table except to luncheon, and her friends are the housekeeper and the butler." Keith, wearied of the banalities at his ear, crossed over to where Mrs. Wentworth stood a little apart from the other ladies. One or two men were talking to her. She was evidently pleased to see him. She talked volubly, and with just that pitch in her voice that betrays a subcurrent of excitement.