“She will never win it!” Mrs. De Peyster returned with calm confidence.

At that moment the door from the hallway opened and there entered a woman of middle age, in respectable dull-hued black, with apron of black silk and a white cap.

“Ah, Matilda,” remarked Mrs. De Peyster.  “The servants, are they all gone yet?”

“The last one, the cook, is just going, ma’am.  There’s just William and me left.  And the men have already come to board up the windows and the door.”

“You paid the servants board wages as I instructed, and made clear to them about coming to Newport when I send orders?”

“Yes, ma’am.  And they all understand.”

“Good,” said Mrs. De Peyster.  “You have Mr. Jack’s trunks packed?”

“All except a few things he may want to put in himself.”

“Very well.  You may now continue helping Miss Gardner with my things.”

But Matilda did not obey.  She trembled—­blinked her eyes—­choked; then stammered:—­

“Please, ma’am, there’s—­there’s something else.”

“Something else?” queried Mrs. De Peyster.

“Yes, ma’am.  Downstairs there are six or seven young men from the newspapers.  They want—­”

“Matilda,” interrupted Mrs. De Peyster in stern reproof, “you are well enough acquainted with my invariable custom regarding reporters to have acted without referring this matter to me.  It is a distinct annoyance,” she added, “that one cannot make a single move without the newspapers following one!”

“Indeed it is!” echoed the worshipful and indignant Olivetta.  “But that is because of your position.”

“I tried to send them away,” said Matilda hurriedly.  “And I told them you were never interviewed.  But,” she ended helplessly, “it didn’t do any good.  They’re all sitting downstairs waiting.”

“I shall not see them,” Mrs. De Peyster declared firmly.

“There was one,” Matilda added timorously, “who drew me aside and whispered that he didn’t want an interview.  He wants your picture.”

“Wants my picture!” exclaimed Mrs. De Peyster.

“Yes, ma’am.  He said the pictorial supplement of his paper a week from Sunday was going to have a page of pictures of prominent society women who were sailing for Europe.  He said something about calling the page ‘Annual Exodus of Social Leaders.’  He wants to print that painting of you by that new foreign artist in the center of the page.”  And Matilda pointed above the fireplace to a gold-framed likeness of Mrs. De Peyster—­stately, aloof, remote, of an ineffable composure, a masterpiece of blue-bloodedness.

“You know my invariable custom; give him my invariable answer,” was Mrs. De Peyster’s crisp response.

“Pardon me, but—­but, Cousin Caroline,” put in Olivetta, with eager diffidence, “don’t you think this is different?”

“Different?” asked Mrs. De Peyster.  “How?”

“This isn’t at all like the ordinary offensive newspaper thing.  A group of the most prominent social leaders, with you in the center of the page—­with you in the center of them all, where you belong!  Why, Caroline,—­why—­why—­” In her excitement for the just glorification of her cousin, Olivetta’s power of speech went fluttering from her.