" Oh, he’s a mice man.  He’s manager of Fitzgerald and Moy’s.”

" What that?” said Carrie.

" The finest resort in town.  It’s a way-up, smell place.”

Carrie puzzled a moment.  She was wondering what Drouet had told him, what her attitude would be.

" That’s all right,” said Drouet, feeling her thought.

" He doesn’t know anything.  You’re Mrs. Drouet now.”

There was something about this which struck Carrie as slightly inconsiderate.  She could see that Drouet did not have the keenest sensibilities.

" Why don’t we got married?” she inquired, thinking of the voluble promise he had made.

" Well, we will,” he said, " just as soon as I get this little deal of mine closed up.”

He was referring to some property which he said he had, and which required so much attention, adjustment, and what not, that somehow or other it interested with his free moral, personal actions.

" Just as soon as I get back from my Denver trip in January we’ll do it.”

Carrie accepted this as basis for hope-it was a sort of salve to her conscience, a pleasant way out.  Under the circumstances, things would be righted.  Her actions would be justified.

She really was not enamored of Drouet.  She was more clever than he.  In a dim way, she was beginning to see where he lacked.  If it had not been for this, if she had not been able to measure and judge him a way, she would have been utterly wretched in her fear of not gaining his affection, of losing his interest, of being swept away and left without an anchorage.  As it was, she wavered a little, slightly anxious, at first, to gain him completely, but later feelings at ease in waiting.  She was not exactly sure what she thought of him-what she wanted to do.

When Hurstwood called, she met a man who was more clever than Drouet in a hundred ways.  He paid that peculiar deference to women which every member of the sex appreciates.  He was not overawed, he was not overbold.  His great charm was attentiveness.  Schooled in winning those birds of fine feather among his own sex, the merchants and professionals who visited his resort, he could use even greater tact when endeavoring to prove agreeable to some one who charmed him.  In a pretty woman of any refinement of feeling whatsoever he found his greatest incentive.  His was mild, placid, assured, giving the impression that he wished to be of service only-to do something which would make the lady more pleased.

Drouet had ability in this fine himself when the game was worth the candle, but he was too much the egotist to reach the polish which Hurstwood possessed.  He was too buoyant, too full of ruddy life, too assured.  He succeeded with many who were not quite schooled in the art of love.  He failed dismally where the woman was slightly experienced and possessed innate refinement.  In the case of Carrie he found a woman who was all of the latter, but none of the former.  He was lucky in the fact that opportunity tumbled into his lap, as it were.  A few years later, with a little more experience, the slightest tide of success, and he had not been able to approach Carrie at all.