A few days later the Gregorys sailed for Bermuda, Rachael with a sense of whipped and smarting shame that was all the more acute because she could not share it with this dearest comrade and confidant.  Warren thought indeed that the miserable episode of the past week had been dismissed from her mind, and delighting like a boy in the little holiday, and proud of his beautiful wife, he found their hours at sea cloudless.  With two men, whose acquaintance was made on the steamer, they played bridge, and Rachael’s game drew other players from all sides to watch her leads and grin over her bidding.  They walked up and down the deck for hours together, they lay side by side in deck chairs lazily watching the blue water creep up and down the painted white ropes of the rail; but they never spoke of Clarence Breckenridge.

The Mardi-Gras dance had been like a hideous dream to Rachael.  She had known that it would be hard from the first sick moment in which the significance of Clarence’s suicide had rushed upon her.  She had known that her arriving guests would be gay and conversational, that the dance and the supper would go with a dash and swing which no other circumstance could more certainly have assured for them; and she knew that in every heart would be the knowledge that Clarence Breckenridge was dying by his own hand, and his daughter on the ocean, and that this woman in the Indian dress, with painted lips and a tiger skin outlining her beautiful figure, had been his wife.

This she had expected, and this was as she had expected.  But there were other circumstances that made her feel even more acutely the turn of the screw.  Joe Butler, always Clarence’s closest friend, did not come to the dance, and at about twelve o’clock an innocent maid delivered to Warren a message that several persons besides Warren heard:  “Mr. Butler to speak to you on the telephone, Doctor Gregory.”

Everyone could surmise where Joe Butler was, but no one voiced the supposition.  Warren, handsome in his skirted coat, knee breeches, and ruffles, disappeared from the room, and the dancing went on.  The scene was unbelievably brilliant, the hot, bright air sweet with flowers and perfume, and the more subtle odors of silk and fine linen and powder on delicate skin.  Warren was presently among them again, and there was a supper, the hostess’ lovely face showing no more strain or concern than was natural to a woman eager to make comfortable nearly a hundred guests.

After supper there was more dancing, and an augmented gayety.  There were no more telephone messages, nor was there any definite foundation for the rumor that was presently stealthily circulating.  Women, powdering their noses as they waited for their wraps, murmured it in the dressing-rooms; a clown, smoking in the hall, confided it to a Mephistopheles; a pastry cook, after his effusive good-nights, confirmed it as he climbed into the motorcar that held the Pierrette who was his wife:  “Dead, poor fellow!”