“Yes, they’re rather—nice,” replied Olivia, wondering why, in trying to qualify them in her mind, this particular adjective had never occurred to her. They were male, they spoke perfect English, they were well-mannered—and so, of course, they were nice. But it was such an inadequate word, completing no idea. Lydia’s atrophied sense of differentiation awoke the laughter in her eyes. Nice! So were Bobby Quinton, Sydney Rooke, Mauregard, a score of other commonplace types in Lydia’s set. But that Blaise Olifant and Alexis Triona should be lumped with them in this vaguely designated category, seemed funny. Lydia went on: “Major Olifant, of course, I knew from your description of him; but the other—the young man with the battered face—I didn’t place him.” “Triona—Alexis Triona.” “I seem to have heard the name,” said Lydia. “He writes or paints or lectures on Eugenics or something.” “He has written a book on Russia,” replied Olivia drily. “I’m fed up with Russia,” said Lydia dismissively. “Even if I wasn’t—I didn’t come here to talk about it. I came in about something quite different. What do you think has happened? Sydney Rooke has asked me to marry him.” Olivia’s eyes flashed with the interest of genuine youth in a romantic proposal of marriage. “My dear!” she cried. “How exciting!” “I wish it were,” said Lydia, in her grey-eyed calmness. “Anyhow, it’s a bit upsetting. Of course I knew that he was married—separated years and years from his wife. Whether he couldn’t catch her out, or she couldn’t catch him out, I don’t know. But they couldn’t get a divorce. She was a Catholic and wouldn’t stand for the usual arrangement. Now she’s dead. Died a couple of months ago in California. He came in this morning with Lady Northborough—introducing her—the first time I had seen the woman. And he sat by and gave advice while she chose half a dozen hats. His judgment’s infallible, you know. He saw her to her car and came back. ‘Now I’ve done you a good turn,’ he said, ‘perhaps you’ll do me one. Give me five minutes with you in your cubby-hole.’ We went into my little office, and then he sprang this on me—the death of his wife and the proposal.” “But it _must_ have been exciting,” Olivia protested. “Yet——” she knitted her brow, “why the Lady Northborough barrage?” “It’s his way,” said Lydia. “What did you tell him?” “I said I would give him my answer to-night.” “Well?” “I don’t know. He’s charming. He’s rolling in money—you remember the motor-car I turned down for obvious reasons—he knows all kinds of nice people—he’s fifty——” “Fifty!” cried Olivia, aghast. To three and twenty fifty is senile. “The widow’s ideal.” “It’s exciting, but not romantic,” said Olivia. “Romance perished on the eleventh of November, 1918. Since then it has been ‘Every woman for herself and the Devil take the hindmost.’ Are you aware that there are not half enough men to go round? So when a man with twenty thousand a year comes along, a woman has to think like—like——”