ff that
gave the place its name.

The man who let him in had apparently received his instructions, for
he led Farnum to a rather small room in the rear of the big house. Its
single occupant was reclining luxuriantly among a number of pillows on
a lounge. From her lips a tiny spiral of smoke rose like incense to the
ceiling. James was conscious of a little ripple of surprise as he looked
down upon the copper crown of splendid hair above which rested the thin
nimbus of smoke. He had expected a less intimate reception.

But the astonishment had been sponged from his face before Valencia Van
Tyle rose and came forward, cigarette in hand.

"You did find time."

"Was it likely I wouldn't?"

"How should I know?" her little shrug seemed to say with an indifference
that bordered on insolence.

James was piqued. After all then she had not opened to him the door to
her friendship. She was merely amusing herself with him as a provincial
_pis aller._

Perhaps she saw his disappointment, for she added with a touch of
warmth: "I'm glad you came. Truth is, I'm bored to death of myself."

"Then I ought to be welcome, for if I don't exorcise the devils of ennui
you can now blame me."

"I shall. Try that big chair, and one of these Egyptians."

He helped himself to a cigarette and lit up as casually as if he had
been in the habit of smoking in the lounging rooms of the ladies he
knew. She watched him sink lazily into the chair and let his glance
go wandering over the room. In his face she read the indolent sense
of pleasure he found in sharing so intimately this sanctum of her more
personal life.

The room was a bit barbaric in its warmth of color, as barbaric as was
the young woman herself in spite of her super-civilization. The walls,
done in an old rose, were gilded and festooned to meet a ceiling almost
Venetian in its scheme of decoration. Pink predominated in the brocaded
tapestries and in the rugs, and the furniture was a luxurious modern
compromise with the Louis Quinze. There were flowers in profusion--his
gaze fell upon the American Beauties he had sent an hour or two ago--and
a disorder of popular magazines and French novels. Farnum did not need
to be told that the room was as much an exotic as its mistress.

"You think?" her amused voice demanded when his eyes came back to her.
"that the room seems made especially for you."

She volunteered information. "My uncle gave me a free hand to arrange
and decorate it.