They chorused, "He must be!" with conviction--the conviction that she was lying like a suburban boomer. Of course she paid him for the work. Grace was in an unphilosophical frame of mind. H. R. had made her the laughing-stock of New York. It would have been ridiculous if it were not so serious to her social plans. She hated him! Being absolutely helpless to help herself, her hatred embraced the world--the world that would laugh at her! All the world! Particularly the women. Especially those of her own age. They would laugh! This is the unforgivable sin in women because their sense of humor is _minus_. And when they laugh-- Just then the avalanche of those she hated the most swooped down upon her. Her eyes were red from acute aqueous mortification. They saw it. They said in chorus, sorrowfully, "You poor thing!" Who said the rich had no hearts? The girls had given to her poverty without her asking for it. It always makes people charitable when they create poverty unasked. "I wouldn't stand it!" cried one. "Nor I!" chorused fourteen of Grace's best friends. Outside, the Avenue, for the first time in its dazzling history, was blocked by automobiles. You would have sworn it was the shopping district in the Christmas week. The reason was that the occupants of the autos had told the chauffeurs to stop until they could read the sandwiches. The reporters were ringing the front-door bell and the rapid-fire tintinnabulation was driving Frederick frantic. Mrs. Goodchild had told him not to send for the police. The reporters, feeling treated like rank outsiders, were in no pleasant frame of mind. Up-stairs Grace, hiding her wrath, overwhelmed by the accursed sympathy of her best friends, said, helplessly, "What can I do?" She didn't like to tell them she wished to bury them with her own hands. From fifteen youthful throats burst forth the same golden word--"_Elope!_" She gasped and stared blankly. "It's the greatest thing I ever heard. I don't know him, but if he is half-way presentable you can teach him table manners in a week. I'd make my father give him a job in the bank!" asserted Marion Beekman. "Me, too!" declared Ethel Vandergilt. "He's just splendid," volunteered a brunette, enthusiastically. "And did you see the papers!" shrieked Verona Mortimer. "I say, _did_ you see the papers? _And_ the pictures! Girls, she's a regular devil, and we never knew it! Where did you hide your brains all these years, Gracie, dear?" "I never would have thought it possible," said the cold, philosophical Katherine Van Schaick. "I call it mighty well engineered. Did _you_ tell him to do it, Grace? If so you are a genius!" "What does he look like?" "Is he of the old New Jersey Rutgers?" "If he's good-looking and has money, what's wrong with him? Booze?" asked a practical one. "He isn't married, is he?" asked a doll-face with Reno in her heavenly eyes. At this a hush fell on the group. It was the big moment. "How exciting!" murmured one.