The room where, mostly, they sat was small, but with a high ceiling, and hung in black, with pagoda-like vermilion chairs. The light, in the evening, was subdued; and Pansy and Judith, in extremely clinging vivid dresses, the former's hair piled high in an amber mass and Judith's drawn severely across her ears, were lovely. Linda thought of the tropical butterflies of the river Amazon, of orchids like those always on the dining-room table. A miniature grand piano stood against the drapery, and Judith often played. Linda learned to recognize some of the composers. Pansy liked best the modern waltzes; Judith insisted that Richard Strauss was incomparable; but Linda developed an overwhelming preference for Gluck. The older girl insisted that this was an affectation; for a while she tried to confuse Linda's knowledge; but finally, playing the airs of “Orpheus and Eurydice,” she admitted that the latter was sincere. “They sound so cool,” Linda said in a clear and decided manner. There was a man with them, and he shook his head in a mock sadness. “So young and yet so formal. If, with the rest, you had Judith's temperament, you would be the most irresistible creature alive. For see, my dear child, as it is you stir neither tenderness nor desire; you are remote and perfect, and faintly wistful. I can't imagine being human or even comfortable with you about. Then, too, you have too much wisdom.” “She is frightful,” Pansy agreed; “she's never upset nor her hair a sight; and, above all else, Linda won't tell you a thing.” “Some day,” Judith informed them from the rippling whisper of the piano, “she will be magnificently loved.” “Certainly,” the man continued; “but what will Linda, Linda Condon, give in return?” “It's a mistake to give much,” Linda said evenly. “No, no, no!” Judith cried. “Give everything; spend every feeling, every nerve.” “You are remarkable, of course; almost no women have the courage of their emotions.” His name was Reynold Chase, a long thin grave young man in a dinner coat, who wrote brilliant and successful comedies. “Yet Linda isn't parsimonious.” He turned to her. “Just what are you? What do you think of love?” “I haven't thought about it much,” she replied slowly. “I'm not sure that I know what it means. At least it hasn't anything to do with marriage--” “Ah!” he interrupted her. Her usually orderly mind grew confused; it eddied as though with the sound of the piano. “It is not marriage,” she vaguely repeated her mother's instruction. Reynold Chase supported her. “That destroys it,” he asserted. “This love is as different as possible from the ignominious impulse eternally tying the young into knots. It's anti-social.” “How stupid you are, Reynold,” Pansy protested. “If you want to use those complicated words take Judith into the drawing-room. I'm sure Linda is dizzy, too.”