"Dear Jim, you are too delicious!" she shrieked. "Really, I shall get you to come and talk to me instead of Mr. Naseby, for you amuse me much more. Arthur, you are dropped; Jim is funnier. Of course we are all going on the 16th, because Pagani and Guardina are both going to sing, and they sing too divinely for words. Also, considering what we all know about them, and considering that they know we all know it, it is exceedingly amusing to see them look at each other with frigid politeness. Why, only the other day Mrs. Maxwell introduced them to each other, saying she must make two great artists acquainted. Too screaming! But you are too delightful and old-fashioned. Your idea about the obligations entailed by hospitality is a savage notion, dear Jim, like cannibalism, and vanishes before the march of civilization. I believe there is an excessively native tribe in Java or Japan, or somewhere, which still practises it. If you eat their salt, they stick to you through thick and thin." Arthur Naseby had joined them. "How too dreadful!" he exclaimed. "Fancy having a lot of assorted savages, thick and thin, sticking to one! It sounds as if one was a kind of superior fly-paper." "Arthur, you mustn't begin talking again, or we shall never get any Bridge," said Mrs. Brereton. "Won't you play, Marie?" "No, I really haven't got time," she said. "I told you I have to go on at half-past ten. Please what time is it, Jim?" "Close on eleven." "Then I must really be moving, Mildred. But Jack will play; he isn't coming on with me." "Where are you going, Lady Alston?" asked Arthur. "To see Blanche Devereux." Arthur Naseby's face fell. "I never knew she was giving a party," he said. Marie laughed, rising. "She isn't; don't be frightened; it is still possible that she has not dropped you, like Mildred. I'm only going to see her about the soldiers' bazaar. In fact, it is because she isn't giving a party that I am going." Jim Spencer got up too. "Will you give me a lift?" he asked. "I am going to Eaton Place also." "Certainly. Good-night, Mildred. Yes, I know my carriage is here. They told me half an hour ago. Jack is stopping to play, I suppose. Please tell him I have taken the carriage." The two went out, and Mrs. Brereton and Naseby stood still looking at them. When they had disappeared they looked at each other. "Dear Marie!" said that lady effusively, "how delighted she evidently is to see Jim Spencer again! Oh, dear, yes, they were very great friends in the old days, very great friends indeed. Come, Arthur, they are waiting for us." "You always have such delightful people at your house," said Arthur, "and you always have something interesting to say about them. And that stiff young man is very rich, is he not?" "Beyond the dreams," said Mrs. Brereton. "I wonder whom he will find to make his money fly for him?"