And he lives on the interest of his income, and
always has a lot left over to invest!"

Mrs. Fisher leaned forward eagerly. "I do believe it is some one's duty
to educate that young man. It is shocking that he has never been made to
realize his duties as a citizen. Every wealthy man should be compelled to
study the laws of his country."

Mrs. Dorset glanced at her quietly. "I think he HAS studied the divorce
laws. He told me he had promised the Bishop to sign some kind of a
petition against divorce."

Mrs. Fisher reddened under her powder, and Stepney said with a laughing
glance at Miss Bart: "I suppose he is thinking of marriage, and wants to
tinker up the old ship before he goes aboard."

His betrothed looked shocked at the metaphor, and George Dorset exclaimed
with a sardonic growl: "Poor devil! It isn't the ship that will do for
him, it's the crew."

"Or the stowaways," said Miss Corby brightly. "If I contemplated a voyage
with him I should try to start with a friend in the hold."

Miss Van Osburgh's vague feeling of pique was struggling for appropriate
expression. "I'm sure I don't see why you laugh at him; I think he's very
nice," she exclaimed; "and, at any rate, a girl who married him would
always have enough to be comfortable."

She looked puzzled at the redoubled laughter which hailed her words, but
it might have consoled her to know how deeply they had sunk into the
breast of one of her hearers.

Comfortable! At that moment the word was more eloquent to Lily Bart than
any other in the language. She could not even pause to smile over the
heiress's view of a colossal fortune as a mere shelter against want: her
mind was filled with the vision of what that shelter might have been to
her. Mrs. Dorset's pin-pricks did not smart, for her own irony cut
deeper: no one could hurt her as much as she was hurting herself, for no
one else--not even Judy Trenor--knew the full magnitude of her folly.

She was roused from these unprofitable considerations by a whispered
request from her hostess, who drew her apart as they left the
luncheon-table.

"Lily, dear, if you've nothing special to do, may I tell Carry Fisher
that you intend to drive to the station and fetch Gus? He will be back at
four, and I know she has it in her mind to meet him. Of course I'm very
glad to have him amused, but I happen to know that she has bled him
rather severely since she's been here, and she is so keen about going to
fetch him that I