“It wasn’t Del Eyre that I came out here to marry.”

“No?”

“No.  It’s Carter Holmesley.  Of course you know about him.”

“By advertisement, also; the society-column kind.”

“Really, you know, he couldn’t keep out of the papers.  He hates it with all his British soul.  But being what he is, a prospective duke, an international poloist, and all that sort of thing, the reporters naturally swarm to him.  Columns and columns; more pictures than a popular danseuse.  And all without his lifting his hand.”

“Une mariage de reclame,” observed Miss Van Arsdale.  “Is it that that constitutes his charm for you?”

Miss Van Arsdale’s smile was still instinct with mockery, but there had crept into it a quality of indulgence.

“No,” answered the girl.  Her face became thoughtful and serious.  “It’s something else.  He—­he carried me off my feet from the moment I met him.  He was drunk, too, that first time.  I don’t believe I’ve ever seen him cold sober.  But it’s a joyous kind of intoxication; vine-leaves and Bacchus and that sort of thing ’weave a circle ’round him thrice’—­you know.  It is honey-dew and the milk of Paradise to him.”  She laughed nervously.  “And charm!  It’s in the very air about him.  He can make me follow his lead like a little curly poodle when I’m with him.”

“Were you engaged to Delavan Eyre when you met him?”

“Oh, engaged!” returned the girl fretfully.  “There was never more than a sort of understanding.  A mariage de convenance on both sides, if it ever came off.  I am fond of Del, too.  But he was South, and the other came like a whirlwind, and I’m—­I’m queer about some things,” she went on half shamefacedly.  “I suppose I’m awfully susceptible to physical impressions.  Are all girls that way?  Or is that gross and—­and underbred?”

“It’s part of us, I expect; but we’re not all so honest with ourselves.  So you decided to throw over Mr. Eyre and marry your Briton.”

“Well—­yes.  The new British Ambassador, who arrives from Japan next week, is Carty’s uncle, and we were going to make him stage-manage the wedding, you see.  A sort of officially certified elopement.”

“More advertisement!” said Miss Van Arsdale coldly.  “Really, Miss Welland, if marriage seems to you nothing more than an opportunity to create a newspaper sensation I cannot congratulate you on your prospects.”

This time her tone stung.  Io Welland’s eyes became sullen.  But her voice was almost caressingly amiable as she said: 

“Tastes differ.  It is, I believe, possible to create a sensation in New York society without any newspaper publicity, and without at all meaning or wishing to.  At least, it was, fifteen years ago; so I’m told.”

Camilla Van Arsdale’s face was white and lifeless and still, as she turned it toward the girl.

“You must have been a very precocious five-year-old,” she said steadily.