Gregory telephoned every few days, and never twice at the same hour. When she found herself restlessly awaiting the ring of the instrument, she dashed out of the house angrily and took a walk. If she found upon her return that he had called her up, she felt that he had given her the excuse to telephone to him, and she soon learned at what hours she could find him either in his cabin or down in the mine, where he had a booth. She was furious at what she called her raging female vanity, and if she could have found another man to assuage it she would not have hesitated to press him into service at whatever cost to himself. But, as happens more often than not, there was not an unmarried man in Butte old enough to be worthy of a fastidious woman’s notice. She would have yawned in the face of “Brownies”, and, although more than one roving husband would have placed himself at her disposal, she was the last woman to court scandal or even gossip. She longed for the advent of Lord John Mowbray, whose gayety would distract her mind, and whose devotion make her forget that she was a neglected wife. She could throw dust into the eyes of Butte by pretending to be his matrimonial sponsor. But for the first time she wished that she had children. The great house seemed to demand the patter of small feet, the slamming of doors, a row of naughty faces peering over the banister of the second floor. It was terribly silent. And yet she had felt settled down in that house at once, so long had one of its kind been the object of her unswerving desire; its atmosphere already seemed to hang listless with ennui. She subscribed to both the state and city suffrage fund, for she felt a new sympathy for women who were trying to fill their lives, and sincerely hoped they would invent some game that would make them independent of men. Seventeen days after her return she was sitting in the library, trying to forget her solitary luncheon in a novel when she heard the front doorbell ring. Her servants were amiable but not too competent, and she waited impatiently and in vain for one of them to answer the summons. She restrained the impulse to open the door herself. This was now an obsolete custom among her new acquaintance; although having the front door shut in one’s face while the colored maid took one’s card to the lady of the stately mansion was hardly an improvement, and this had been her experience a day or two ago. She rang the bell in the library. Still there was no sign of life from the high-priced young women who doubtless were gossipping over the back fence. Ida’s curiosity overcame her. The hour was too early for callers. It might be a cable. She stole to the front door and peered through its curtain of Honiton lace. Then she gave a war whoop which would have horrified her servants--who, careless as they were, stood in awe of her--flung the door open, caught Ora in her arms and almost carried her into the library.