with a bored monosyllable, the girl flew to the latter's defence.

"'Yes' and 'no,' is it?" she blazed. "Henry Phipps, ye 're like the
ass in the colored skin--not half as proud as ye 're painted. A
bowler, ye are! But ye take yer hat off after the game, just the same,
and bowl out yer masters with a 'thank ye, sur; my misthake!' Ye
grovellin' thing, ya!"

"Really," yawned Henry in his rich dialect.

"Really!" mocked the girl. "I could give ye talk about a real
Prince--none of yer Rensselaers or Van Antwerps and the like--had I--"

Armitage leaned forward, but anything more the maid might have been
tempted to say was interrupted by a footman from the superintendent's
table.

"Mr. Dawson says you 're to come to his table," he said nodding to
Armitage, who arose with real reluctance, not because of any desire for
intimate knowledge of the servants' hall, but because he had decided he
could use the Irish maid to the ends he had in view. Now that lead was
closed for the time at least and he took his place at the side of the
decorous butler, uncheered by Mr. Dawson's announcement that Miss
Wellington had ordered his promotion.

"It was very good of Miss Wellington," he said in a perfunctory manner.

"Oh, not at all," replied the butler. "Frequently the chauffeur sits
at our table." He shrugged his shoulders. "It depends upon the manner
of men. They are of all sorts and constantly changing."

Armitage glanced at Buchan and grinned.

"Thanks," he said.

The butler nodded and then _apropos_ of some thought passing through
his mind he glanced tentatively at the housekeeper.

"We 'll wake up, I suppose, with the Prince here. I hope so. I have
never seen everybody in Newport so quiet."

"Yes, I imagine so," replied Mrs. Stetson. "Several are coming the
middle of the week and of course you know of the Flower Ball for Friday
night."

"Of course," said the butler, who a second later belied his assumption
of knowledge by muttering, "Flower Ball, eh! Gracious, I wonder what
won't Mrs. Wellington be up to next!"

"I don't think I like Prince Koltsoff," said Miss Hatch.

"Well," agreed the superintendent, "he's a Russian."

"Oh, I don't care about _that_," replied the young woman. "He is going
to marry Miss Wellington--and he 's not the man for her. He 's not the
man for any girl as nice as Anne Wellington. Think of it. Ugh!"

"So!" interjected the tutor, Dumois, who had turned many a dollar
supply