t him know--on the strength of a chance meeting with Lady
Ermyntrude--that the Winterbournes would be at the Masterton party on
the 26th. They had persuaded Miss Boyce to stay for it, and she would go
back to her work the Monday after. Wharton carelessly replied that he
did not know whether he would be able to put in an appearance at the
Mastertons'. He might be going out of town.

Mrs. Lane looked at him and said, "Oh, really!" with a little laugh.

* * * * *

Lady Masterton was the wife of the Colonial Secretary, and her grand
mansion in Grosvenor Square was the principal rival to Alresford House
in the hospitalities of the party. Her reception on July 25 was to be
the last considerable event of a protracted but now dying season.
Marcella, detained in James Street day after day against her will by the
weakness of the injured arm and the counsels of her doctor, had at last
extracted permission to go back to work on the 27th; and to please Betty
Macdonald she had promised to go with the Winterbournes to the Masterton
party on the Saturday. Betty's devotion, shyly as she had opened her
proud heart to it, had begun to mean a good deal to her. There was balm
in it for many a wounded feeling; and, besides, there was the constant,
half eager, half painful interest of watching Betty's free and childish
ways with Aldous Raeburn, and of speculating upon what would ultimately
come out of them.

So, when Betty first demanded to know what she was going to wear, and
then pouted over the dress shown her, Marcella submitted humbly to being
"freshened up" at the hands of Lady Ermyntrude's maid, bought what Betty
told her, and stood still while Betty, who had a genius for such things,
chattered, and draped, and suggested.

"I wouldn't make you fashionable for the world!" cried Betty, with a
mouthful of pins, laying down masterly folds of lace and chiffon the
while over the white satin with which Marcella had provided her. "What
was it Worth said to me the other day?--Ce qu'on porte, Mademoiselle? O
pas grand'chose!--presque pas de corsage, et pas du tout de
manches!'--No, that kind of thing wouldn't suit you. But _distinguished_
you shall be, if I sit up all night to think it out!"

In the end Betty was satisfied, and could hardly be prevented from
hugging Marcella there and then, out of sheer delight in her own
handiwork, when at last the party emerged from the cloak-room into the
Mastertons' crowd