I counted it to the credit of her tact and kindliness that she chatted in this way long enough for me to get my breath, while Mrs. Billing turned her lorgnette on the room with which she must have once been familiar. If there was to be anything like rivalry between Lady Cissie and me I gathered that she wouldn't stoop to petty feminine advantages. Dressed in dark green, with a small hat of the same color worn dashingly, she had that air of being the absolutely finished thing which the tones of her voice announced to you. My heart grew faint at the thought that Hugh would have to choose between this girl, so certain of herself, and me. As we were all standing, I invited my callers to sit down. To this Lady Cecilia acceded, though old Mrs. Billing strolled off to renew her acquaintance with the room. I may say here that I call her old because to be old was a kind of pose with her. She looked old and "dressed old" so as to enjoy the dictatorial privileges that go with being old, when as a matter of fact she was only sixty, which nowadays is young. "You're English, aren't you?" Lady Cecilia began, as soon as we were alone. "I can tell by the way you speak." I said I was a Canadian, that I was in New York more or less by accident, and might go back to my own country again. "How interesting! It belongs to us, Canadia, doesn't it?" With a slightly ironic emphasis on the proper noun I replied that Canadia naturally belonged to the Canadians, but that the King of Great Britain and Ireland was our king, and that we were very loyal to all that we represented. "Fancy! And isn't it near here?" All of Canada, I stated, was north of some of the United States, and some of it was south of others of the United States, but none of the more settled parts was difficult of access from New York. "How very odd!" was her comment on these geographical indications. "I think I remember that a cousin of ours was governor out there--or something--though perhaps it was in India." I named the series of British noblemen who had ruled over us since the confederation of the provinces in 1867, but as Lady Cecilia's kinsman was not among them we concluded that he must have been Viceroy of India or Governor-General of Australia. The theme served to introduce us to each other, and lasted while Mrs. Billing's tour of inspection kept her within earshot.