The truth was, at that moment he had caught sight of a face which had set his heart beating wildly, for he felt sure it was that of Mary Bolitho. "Oh, I wonder, after all, whether it can be!" he said to himself. Regardless of passing faces, he found his way toward the spot where he thought he had seen her, and to his delight he discovered that he had not made a mistake. Their eyes met as he came up, and she held out her hand with a smile. "This is splendid!" he said. "It's so pleasant to see a face that one knows amid a crowd of strangers!" "But surely you must know hosts of people here," was her response. "No, I know very few," replied Paul. "Some of the men I have met in the Members' Lobby, but nearly everyone is a stranger to me." "And yet I find that many people are talking about you!" was her reply. "You are quite the lion of the evening. It must be very gratifying to you." "Do you know," replied Paul, "that I am not so unsophisticated as not to know the value of these things?" She looked at him inquiringly. "I can see how much a moment's popularity is worth," he said, almost bitterly. "A lifetime of good work is passed by unnoticed, but if one happens to make a speech that causes a certain amount of discussion, no matter how silly it may be, one gets noticed until someone else appears. And my speech was a very poor one! I feel ashamed every time I am complimented on it!" There was something in the way he spoke that annoyed her, why she could not tell. "Then I will not add to your shame," she said. "No," he replied eagerly. "But I do want you to think well of it even although I know it was a failure. I have been wondering lately if I should meet you, and I was afraid once or twice lest I had seen you." "I do not quite understand." "I am comparatively new to this sort of function," said Paul. "And, to tell you the truth, I have been very weary of it all." "How disappointed your hostess would be if she knew!" "No," said Paul, "I don't deserve that. But I suppose it's because I have not been brought up in this world. I am a plain, humble fellow, and have had to work my way through the grimy and sordid things of life. Still, there's something real in it, something healthy, too, compared with this--at least, some of it. The other night I was at a banquet, and I was afraid I saw you. You see, I have all sorts of old-fashioned ideas. I'm a Puritan of a sort, and am what these people would call bourgeois." "What in the world do you mean?" "I saw a girl who looked like you smoking a cigarette. She had the same coloured hair, and bore such a strong resemblance to you that my heart became as heavy as lead. A little later I saw the same girl, or someone very much like her, drinking a liqueur. Of course, it seemed quite the order of the day, and I ought not to be shocked, but had it been you I should have been very sad." "Why, what is there so terrible in a cigarette or a liqueur?" asked Mary Bolitho.