"I do mean it, and if you'll take my advice you'll be warned in time." Polly turned, expecting to find Marie Louise showing her contemptuous amusement, but the look she saw on Marie Louise's face was disconcerting. Polly's loyalty remained staunch. She hated Lady Clifton-Wyatt anyway, and the thought that she might be telling the truth made her a little more hatable. Polly stormed: "I won't permit you to slander my best friend." Lady Clifton-Wyatt replied, "I don't slahnda hah, and if she is yaw best friend--well--" Lady Clifton-Wyatt hated Polly and was glad of the weapon against her. Polly felt a sudden terrific need of retorting with a blow. Men had never given up the fist on the mouth as the simple, direct answer to an insult too complicated for any other retort. She wanted to slap Lady Clifton-Wyatt's face. But she did not know how to fight. Perhaps women will acquire the male prerogative of the smash in the jaw along with the other once exclusive masculine privileges. It will do them no end of good and help to clarify all life for them. But for the present Polly could only groan, "Agh!" and turn to throw an arm about Marie Louise and drag her forward. "I'd believe one word of Marie Louise against a thousand of yours," she declared. "Very well--ahsk hah, then." Polly was crying mad, and madder than ever because she hated herself for crying when she got mad. She almost sobbed now to Marie Louise, "Tell her it's a dirty, rotten lie." Marie Louise had been dragged to her feet. She temporized, "What has she sai-said?" Polly snickered nervously, "Oh, nothing--except that you were a German spy." And now somewhere, somehow, Marie Louise found the courage of desperation. She laughed: "Lady Clifton-Wyatt is notori--famous for her quaint sense of humor." Lady Clifton-Wyatt sneered, "Could one expect a spy to admit it?" Marie Louise smiled patiently. "Probably not. But surely even you would hardly insist that denying it proves it?" This sophistry was too tangled for Polly. She spoke up: "Let's have the details, Lady Clifton-Wyatt--if you don't mind." "Yes, yes," the chorus murmured. Lady Clifton-Wyatt braced herself. "Well, in the first place Miss Webling is not Miss Webling." "Oh, but I am," said Marie Louise. Lady Clifton-Wyatt gasped, "You don't mean to pretend that--" "Did you read the will?" said Marie Louise. "No, of course not, but--" "It says there that I was their daughter." "Well, we'll not quibble. Legally you may have been, but actually you were their adopted child." "Yis?" said Marie Louise. "And where did they find me? Had you heard?" "Since you force me to it, I must say that it is generally believed that you were the natural daughter of Sir Joseph." Marie Louise was tremendously relieved by having something that she could deny. She laughed with a genuineness that swung the credulity all her way. She asked: "And who was my mother--my natural mother, could you tell me? I really ought to know."