e. She had drawn them all into her shabby little home. "Magnetic,"
as the great lady said. It is a power much desired in democratic
societies where all must be done by the individual of his own
initiative--a power independent of birth, education, money,--with a
touch of the mystery of genius in it, of course.

Milly drew all kinds, indiscriminately,--even men, who didn't count for
much in this woman's game of entertaining, except for the fact that they
came. Yes, Mrs. Bernhard Bowman, who knew that people came to her chilly
halls merely to have it known that they _could_ come, might well envy
poor little Milly Ridge her one magnet gift.

"And so sweet," Mrs. Gilbert cooed fondly, watching her protege.

At the moment Milly was listening to an elderly lady of the species
frump, with two homely daughters of the species bore,--obviously West
Side relics,--and she gave them the same whole-hearted interest she had
given the majestic one herself. The two older, experienced women gazed
at the scene half enviously. This was another magic quality that the
girl possessed,--especially feminine, a tricksy gift of the Gods, quite
outside the moral categories and therefore desired by all--charm. Charm
made all that mob so happy to be there in the stuffy quarters,
struggling to appease their thirst with the dregs of tepid sherbet;
charm compelled the warm, enthusiastic speeches to the girl. As Eleanor
Kemp whispered, pinching Milly's plump arm, "My dear, you are a wonder,
just a perfect wonder,--I always said so.... I'll run in to-morrow to
talk it over...."

All the women, richer, better placed in the game than Milly, easily
detecting the shabbiness of her home beneath the attempts to furbish up,
envied the girl these two gifts. Why? Because they most help a woman to
be what civilization has forced her to be--a successful adventuress.

* * * * *

"Milly is such a sweet creature," Mrs. Gilbert purred to her companion,
as she sank back into the silky softness of the brougham that Roy
Gilbert had provided for her. "I do hope she'll marry well!"

"Of course she must marry properly,--some man who will give her the
opportunity of exercising her remarkable social gift," Mrs. Bowman
pronounced sagely.

Nettie Gilbert smiled. She felt that she had done a kind act that day.

"The girl has a career before her, if she makes no mistakes," the great
lady added.

And that was the universal verdict of all the