“You didn’t know Jack had become our social censor?” Mrs. Fisher said to Selden with a laugh; and Stepney spluttered, amid the general derision: “But she’s a cousin, hang it, and when a man’s married—TOWN TALK was full of her this morning.” “Yes: lively reading that was,” said Mr. Ned Van Alstyne, stroking his moustache to hide the smile behind it. “Buy the dirty sheet? No, of course not; some fellow showed it to me—but I’d heard the stories before. When a girl’s as good-looking as that she’d better marry; then no questions are asked. In our imperfectly organized society there is no provision as yet for the young woman who claims the privileges of marriage without assuming its obligations.” “Well, I understand Lily is about to assume them in the shape of Mr. Rosedale,” Mrs. Fisher said with a laugh. “Rosedale—good heavens!” exclaimed Van Alstyne, dropping his eye-glass. “Stepney, that’s your fault for foisting the brute on us.” “Oh, confound it, you know, we don’t MARRY Rosedale in our family,” Stepney languidly protested; but his wife, who sat in oppressive bridal finery at the other side of the room, quelled him with the judicial reflection: “In Lily’s circumstances it’s a mistake to have too high a standard.” “I hear even Rosedale has been scared by the talk lately,” Mrs. Fisher rejoined; “but the sight of her last night sent him off his head. What do you think he said to me after her TABLEAU? ‘My God, Mrs. Fisher, if I could get Paul Morpeth to paint her like that, the picture’d appreciate a hundred per cent in ten years.’” “By Jove,—but isn’t she about somewhere?” exclaimed Van Alstyne, restoring his glass with an uneasy glance. “No; she ran off while you were all mixing the punch down stairs. Where was she going, by the way? What’s on tonight? I hadn’t heard of anything.” “Oh, not a party, I think,” said an inexperienced young Farish who had arrived late. “I put her in her cab as I was coming in, and she gave the driver the Trenors’ address.” “The Trenors’?” exclaimed Mrs. Jack Stepney. “Why, the house is closed—Judy telephoned me from Bellomont this evening.” “Did she? That’s queer. I’m sure I’m not mistaken. Well, come now, Trenor’s there, anyhow—I—oh, well—the fact is, I’ve no head for numbers,” he broke off, admonished by the nudge of an adjoining foot, and the smile that circled the room. In its unpleasant light Selden had risen and was shaking hands with his hostess. The air of the place stifled him, and he wondered why he had stayed in it so long. On the doorstep he stood still, remembering a phrase of Lily’s: “It seems to me you spend a good deal of time in the element you disapprove of.”