And another thing worried the pretty spinster—­the comings, goings, and occult doings of her nephew with the most distractingly lovely and utterly impossible girl that fate ever designed to harass the soul of any young man’s aunt.

That Hamil was already in love with Shiela Cardross had become painfully plainer to her every time she saw him.  True, others were in love with Miss Cardross; that state of mind and heart seemed to be chronic at Palm Beach.  Gussie Vetchen openly admitted his distinguished consideration, and Courtlandt Classon toddled busily about Shiela’s court, and even the forlorn Cuyp had become disgustingly unfaithful and no longer wrinkled his long Dutch nose into a series of white corrugations when Wayward took Miss Palliser away from him.  Alas! the entire male world seemed to trot in the wake of this sweet-eyed young Circe, emitting appealingly gentle and propitiating grunts.

“The very deuce is in that girl!” thought Constance, exasperated; “and the sooner Garry goes North the better.  He’s madly unhappy over her....  Fascinating little thing! I can’t blame him too much—­except that he evidently realises he can’t marry such a person—­”

The chair rolled into the hotel grounds under the arch of jasmine.  The orchestra was playing in the colonnade; tea had been served under the cocoa-nut palms; pretty faces and gay toilets glimmered familiarly as the chair swept along the edge of the throng.

“Tell the chair-boy that we’ll tea here, Jim,” said Miss Palliser, catching sight of her nephew and the guilty Circe under whose gentle thrall Hamil was now boldly imbibing a swizzle.

So Wayward nodded to the charioteer, the chair halted, and he and Constance disembarked and advanced across the grass to exchange amenities with friends and acquaintances.  Which formalities always fretted Wayward, and he stood about, morose and ungracious, while Constance floated prettily here and there, and at last turned with nicely prepared surprise to encounter Shiela and Hamil seated just behind her.

The younger girl, rising, met her more than half-way with gloved hand frankly offered; Wayward turned to Hamil in subdued relief.

“Lord!  I’ve been looking at those confounded alligators and listening to Vetchen’s and Cuyp’s twaddle!  Constance wouldn’t talk; and I’m quite unfit for print.  What’s that in your glass, Garry?”

“A swizzle—­”

“Anything in it except lime-juice and buzz?”

“Yes—­”

“Then I won’t have one.  Constance!  Are you drinking tea?”

“Do you want some?” she asked, surprised.

“Yes, I do—­if you can give me some without asking how many lumps I take—­like the inevitable heroine in a British work of fiction—­”

“Jim, what a bear you are to-day!” And to Shiela, who was laughing:  “He snapped and growled at Gussie Vetchen and he glared and glowered at Livingston Cuyp, and he’s scarcely vouchsafed a word to me this afternoon except the civility you have just heard.  Jim, I will ask you how many lumps—­”