Beecher was giving his hand to Mrs. Craig Fontaine, a young widow, slight, with quick eyes, and almost masculine vitality, and an extraordinary elegance of dress and carriage, whom Gunther called Louise. She was scarcely twenty-six, possessed of a large fortune from her husband, who had been killed in a steeplechase three years before. Her position in society was unquestioned, and, being of a singular temperament, she did as she pleased. She was seen everywhere with young Gunther, and gossip had already arranged their marriage—an eventuality which she alone, who ambitiously desired it, knew to be impossible. Beecher, who was particularly sensitive to the air of distinction that always surrounded her, even when most unbending, took her hand with a little extra gallantry, saying: "I changed my mind on your account only, Louise, and I expect you to reward me." Between the two, from his college days, had been a sort of confidential intimacy which Beecher had the knack of cultivating. Holliday having ordered the dinner, Mme. Fornez took special delight in countermanding everything that could be countermanded, substituting other wines and abolishing the soup, scolding her escort all the while with a calculated tyranny which Mrs. Fontaine admired with a slight smiling tribute of her lips, as the clever advertisement of a professional woman that Mr. Holliday’s fetch and carry attentions were entirely on her own sufferance. "How have you escaped being married?" said Mrs. Fontaine in a bantering tone to Beecher, after Mme. Fornez had relinquished him for a moment. "Because I fly like a coward," he said, pleased at the compliment implied. "Seriously, Teddy, you’ve been back in civilization two months and you are not yet caught?" "I am not the marrying kind," he said, with conviction. "What’s he say—your Teddy?" said Mme. Fornez, turning, with a laugh. Beecher repeated his statement. "_Allons donc_, you!" She broke into a ripple of laughter. "What do you say, Madame Fontaine?" Mrs. Fontaine’s reply was a tolerant, amused smile, and, leaning over, she pinched his ear. Beecher furiously defended himself. "Yes, that’s what all you women say. You think you can catch any man. It irritates you to think any man can resist you." "Ah, no, no," said Mme. Fornez energetically. "There are lots of men who can’t be married. I don’t say that, but what I say is this: a woman knows, the moment she meets one of you, if he is the kind that marries. A clever woman knows if she can marry him, but all women know if he is the marrying kind the moment they look in his eye. Is it not so, Madame Fontaine?" "Of course," said Mrs. Fontaine calmly, with a glance around the table. "Nonsense," said Beecher valiantly; "women are as easily fooled as men." Mme. Fornez, drawing back her head, surveyed him critically.