So the ice was broken between them; which filled Montague with a vast relief.  But he was still dimly touched with awe—­for he realized that this must be the great Mrs. Billy Alden, whose engagement to the Duke of London was now the topic of the whole country.  And that huge diamond ornament must be part of Mrs. Alden’s million-dollar outfit of jewellery!

The great lady volunteered not to tell on him; and added generously that when he came to dinner with her she would post him concerning the company.  “It’s awkward for a stranger, I can understand,” said she; and continued, grimly:  “When people get divorces it sometimes means that they have quarrelled—­and they don’t always make it up afterward, either.  And sometimes other people quarrel—­almost as bitterly as if they had been married.  Many a hostess has had her reputation ruined by riot keeping track of such things.”

So Montague made the discovery that the great Mrs. Billy, though. forbidding of aspect, was good-natured when she chose to be, and with a pretty wit.  She was a woman with a mind of her own—­a hard-fighting character, who had marshalled those about her, and taken her place at the head of the column.  She had always counted herself a personage enough to do exactly as she pleased; through the course of the dinner she would take up the decanter of Scotch, and make a pass to help Montague—­and then, when he declined, pour out imperturbably what she wanted.  “I don’t like your brother,” she said to him, a little later.  “He won’t last; but he tells me you’re different, so maybe I will like you.  Come and see me sometime, and let me tell you what not to do in New York.”

Then Montague turned to talk with his hostess, who say on his right.

“Do you play bridge?” asked Mrs. Winnie, in her softest and most gracious tone.

“My brother has given me a book to study from,” he answered.  “But if he takes me about day and night, I don’t know how I’m to manage it.”

“Come and let me teach you,” said Mrs. Winnie.  “I mean it, really,” she added.  “I’ve nothing to do—­at least that I’m not tired of.  Only I don’t believe you’d take long to learn all that I know.”

“Aren’t you a successful player?” he asked sympathetically.

“I don’t believe anyone wants me to learn,” said Mrs. Winnie.—­“They’d rather come and get my money.  Isn’t that true, Major?”

Major Venable sat on her other hand, and he paused in the act of raising a spoonful of soup to his lips, and laughed, deep down in his throat—­a queer little laugh that shook his fat cheeks and neck.  “I may say,” he said, “that I know several people to whom the status quo is satisfactory.”

“Including yourself,” said the lady, with a little moue.  “The wretched man won sixteen hundred dollars from me last night; and he sat in his club window all afternoon, just to have the pleasure of laughing at me as I went by.  I don’t believe I’ll play at all to-night—­I’m going to make myself agreeable to Mr. Montague, and let you win from Virginia Landis for a change.”