“What do you mean?” Nigel demanded.

“Why, Immelan, of course,” she replied.  “He’s head over ears in love with Naida.  Any one can see that.”

Nigel laughed scornfully.

“My dear child,” he protested, “can you imagine a woman like Naida thinking seriously of a fellow like Immelan?—­a scheming, Teutonic adventurer, without even the breeding of his class!”

Maggie laughed softly for several moments.

“My dear Nigel,” she exclaimed, “what a luxury to get at the man of you!  I haven’t seen your eyes flash like that for ages.  The cocktails, thank goodness!  Shake one for me till it froths all the way up the glass, please, and then give me a cigarette.”

Nigel obeyed orders, helped himself, and glanced at the clock as Brookes left the room.

“How nice of you to come half an hour early, Maggie!” he remarked.

She made a little grimace.

“The first time you have noticed it,” she said dolefully.  “Do you realise, Nigel, that it is nearly a week since you proposed to me?  Apart from your penchant for Naida, don’t you really want to marry me any more?”

He came across the room and stood looking down at her thoughtfully.  She was wearing a somewhat daringly fashioned black lace gown, which showed a good deal of her white shoulders and neck.  Her brown hair was simply but artistically arranged.  She was piquante, alluring, with a provocative smile at the corners of her lips and a challenging gleam in her eyes.  The daintiness and femininity of her were enthralling.

“You would make an adorable wife,” he reflected.

“For some one else?”

“An unspeakable proposition,” he assured her.

“You’re very nice-looking, Nigel,” she murmured.

“You’re terribly attractive, Maggie!”

“Then why is it,” she sighed, “that we neither of us want to marry the other?”

“If a serious proposition would really be of interest to you,” he began,—­

She made a little grimace.

“You heard them coming,” she interrupted.

The three expected guests arrived almost together, bringing with them, at any rate so far as Chalmers and Naida were concerned, an atmosphere of light-heartedness which was later on to make the little dinner party a complete success.  Naida, too, was in black, a gown simpler than Maggie’s but full of distinction.  She wore no jewellery except a wonderful string of pearls.  Her black hair was brushed straight back from her forehead but drooped a little over her ears.  She seemed to bring with her a larger share of girlishness than any of them had previously observed in her, as though she had made up her mind for this one evening to cast herself adrift from the graver cares of life and to indulge in the frivolities which after all were the heritage of her youth.  She sat at Nigel’s right hand and plied him with questions as to the lighter side of his life,—­his favourite sport, books, and general occupation.  She gave evidences of humour which delighted everybody, and Nigel, though he would at times have welcomed, and did his best to initiate, an incursion into more serious subjects, found himself compelled to admire the tact with which she continually foiled him.