the curb Davidge's first question was:

"How's your gasolene supply?"

"Full up, boss."

Marie Louise laughed. "You don't want to spend another night in a taxi
with me, I see."

Davidge writhed at this deduction. He started to say, "I'd be glad to
spend the rest of my life in a taxi with you." That sounded a little
too flamboyant, especially with a driver listening in. So he said
nothing but "Huh!"

He explained to the driver the route to Grinden Hall, and they set
forth.

Marie Louise had a dilemma of her own. Lady Clifton-Wyatt had had the
last word, and it had been an invitation to Davidge to call on her.
Worse yet, he had accepted it. Lady Clifton-Wyatt's purpose was, of
course, to rob Marie Louise of this last friend. Perhaps the wretch
had a sentimental interest in Davidge, too. She was a widow and a
man-grabber; she still had a tyrannic beauty and a greed of conquest.
Marie Louise was determined that Davidge should not fall into her
clutches, but she could hardly exact a promise from him to stay away.

The taxi was crossing the aqueduct bridge before she could brave
the point. She was brazen enough to say, "You'll accept Lady
Clifton-Wyatt's invitation to tea, of course?"

"Oh, I suppose so," said Davidge. "No American woman can resist a
lord; so how could an American man resist a Lady?"

"Oh!"

This helpless syllable expressed another defeat for Marie Louise. When
they reached the house she bade him good night without making any
arrangement for a good morrow, though Davidge held her hand decidedly
longer than ever before.

She stood on the portico and watched his cab drive off. She gazed
toward Washington and did not see the dreamy constellation it made
with the shaft of the Monument ghostly luminous as if with a
phosphorescence of its own. She felt an outcast indeed. She imagined
Polly hurrying back to ask questions that could not be dodged any
longer. She had no right to defend herself offensively from the
rightful demands of a friend and hostess. Besides, the laws of
hospitality would not protect her from Polly's temper. Polly would
have a perfect right to order her from the house. And she would, too,
when she knew everything. It would be best to decamp before being
asked to.

Marie Louise whirled and sped into the house, rang for the maid, and
said:

"My trunks! Please have them brought down--or up, from wherever they
are, will you?"

"Your trunks, miss!"

"And a taxicab. I shall have