It takes experience to teach distrust to those frolicsome playmates, Youth and Buoyancy.  She had met with that experience and had learned that fortune-hunters are by no means mythical or extinct.  When to the honey-pot of wealth is added the lure of beauty, how can one be sure that any proffered love is free from the taint of greed?  Her brother was one of America’s most brilliant money-getters.  He gathered in and disbursed with a lavish magnificence.  She had been called the most beautiful woman in Europe and her gem-like brilliancy had been set in Life’s gold and platinum of environment.  When Cupid came to her what bill of health could he produce to prove that he was not a sneak-thief in disguise?  She had accepted the cynical conclusion that she might never be sure of any man’s love and the tenderer little heart-nerves which govern impulse were growing numb.  Under a naive freshness and girlish fragrance of personality, lay masked batteries of distrust and hardness.  The Duke de Metuan fancied himself genuinely in love with her.  Of that she was sure, but should the Duke de Metuan learn tomorrow morning that she had overnight become penniless—­she broke off and laughed.

And tonight had come the unwarned tumult of feeling against which she possessed no argument.  Jefferson Edwardes had looked at her and his eyes were a guarantee of honesty beyond question.  She did not even ask to see the Love God’s passport.  This man was a member of a great family of bankers; a family that had stood for generations among the richest in the country.  Ham’s magic control of the money tides could not even subconsciously influence his decisions.

It was wonderful to sit there in the window, adrift on a tide of elation, and to know that the numbness of her heart was not a permanent paralysis—­that she had a soul.  It was absurdedly delightful, too, to reflect upon the illogical swiftness with which it had all happened.

“Tomorrow,” she announced to herself, nodding her head very decisively, “I shall be furious with him.  I shall refuse to speak to him.  I shall let him realize that such lordly assumption brings swift retribution.”  Then, low and gaily, she laughed.  “After I’ve punished him I’ll be very nice to him, unless—­” her lips tightened as she added—­“unless he says he’s sorry he did it and apologizes.  If he does that I’ll never speak to him again.”

* * * * *

While Mary was spending so comfortable and pleasing an hour with her reflections and while Jefferson Edwardes was tramping the hills several miles away, a small number of unattached men lingered near the punch-bowl and cigars in the huge living-room of the lodge.

One of these refugees from the zone of dancing activities was of more than ordinarily striking appearance.  When he stood he towered and even when he sat, as now, morosely lounging and taciturn, he bulked large and wore a countenance of such strength and determination as suited his giant body.  In spite of his great physique he carried no superfluous flesh, but tapered to the waist and, notwithstanding his present detachment and a seriousness that verged on sullenness, the face seemed more patterned by nature for the broad grin of good fellowship and clean mirthfulness.