He admired diamonds, and now that she was nearly twenty-three, he had said to himself that even her mother, if she had lived, would no longer have objected to her wearing them. He had therefore bought for her recently a superb necklace, bracelets, and other ornaments, and he had pleased himself with the thought that for this official occasion they would be entirely appropriate. Ruth, reading his disappointment in his eyes, went out, and returned a few minutes later adorned with all his gifts to the very last stone. And now, as she came up the lane in the centre of the crowded room, the gems gleamed and flashed, gleamed on her neck, on her arms, in her hair, and in the filmy lace of her dress. Always tall, she had grown more womanly, and she could therefore bear the splendor. To-night, in addition, her own face was striking, for her color had returned, and her extraordinarily beautiful eyes were at their best--lustrous and profound. It had always been said of Ruth that her beauty came and went. To-night it had certainly come, and to such a degree that it spurred Etheridge to the exclamation, in an undertone: "Too many diamonds. But, by George, she shines them down!" After the presentation was over Chase stepped aside, and, with his wife, joined Dolly. Dolly had a very good place; draped in her opera-cloak, which was made of a rich Oriental fabric, she looked odd, ugly, and distinguished. "Everybody is here except the Barclays," Etheridge announced. "There can't be a soul left in any of the hotels. And all the negroes in town are on the sea-wall outside, ready to hurrah when the great man drives away." "Here's Walter. He is coming this way--he is looking for _us_," said Chase. "How are you, Walter?" "Mrs. Chase! Delighted to meet you again," said Willoughby, shaking hands with Ruth with the utmost cordiality. "My sister is here also," Ruth answered, moving aside so that he could see Dolly. And then Walter greeted Miss Franklin with the same extreme heartiness. "Bless my soul, what enthusiasm!" commented Etheridge. "One would suppose that you had not met for years." "And we haven't," said Ruth, surveying Walter, coolly. "Mr. Willoughby has changed. He has a sort of Chinese air." "Willoughby has been living in California for two years, commodore; didn't you know that?" Chase explained, inwardly enjoying his wife's sally. "_I've_ been to California four times since then. But as he hasn't been east, the ladies have lost sight of him." "Are you returning to the Pacific?" Etheridge inquired of the younger man, "so as to look more Chinese still?" "The Celestial air I have already caught will have to do," Walter answered, laughing. "California is a wonderfully fascinating country. But I am not going back; the business which took me there is concluded."