the most
charming studio."

"Bea said it was the dreamiest thing you ever saw and that she herself
was a vision. Do you suppose she gets herself up that way really to
conceal her identity, or is it to arouse more interest and enthusiasm?"

"How does she get herself up?" asked Hayden, with, however, no particular
interest in his tones.

"Tell him, Kitty. I haven't been fortunate enough to see her yet,"
replied the blue fillet--Mrs. Edith Symmes, by the way.

"Oh, it is too fascinating for anything." Kitty was eager to discuss her
own particular find. "She is tall and graceful, oh, grace itself, and she
wears a long black gown, Paris unmistakably, and"--Kitty threw great
emphasis on this "and," and paused a moment for dramatic effect--"she
wears a mantilla about her head, and a little black mask, with fringe
falling from it so that even her mouth is concealed. It gives you the
queerest creepy feeling when she comes into the room."

"How odd! How deliciously dreadful!" Mrs. Symmes shivered luxuriously.
"Do write or telephone her and make an appointment for me, Kitty, dear.
They say that if I do so on my own account I shall have to wait weeks and
weeks, there are so many ahead of me; but you've been such an awfully
efficient press-agent that she will do anything for you."

"But her prices! Her dreadful prices!" sighed a plaintive feminine voice
from the other side of the table. "Have you seen her, Mr. Hayden?"

"Indeed I have not," returned Hayden, "and I haven't the faintest
intention of seeing her. I can't understand why you waste your money on
those people. They have absolutely nothing to tell you, and they are
fakers and worse, in every instance. You know it, each one of you, and
yet you continue to patronize them."

"Hear him preach!" scoffed his cousin.

"Kitty, you are the source of all our information this evening," broke in
a woman on her left. "Do tell us if it is true that Marcia Oldham's
engagement to Wilfred Ames is really announced."

Hayden, his eyes on Kitty's face, could positively see it stiffen. "I
really know nothing about it," she answered coldly.

"But they are together so much."

"There are always a lot of men about Marcia." Kitty's tone was ominously
curt.

"Oh, it is perfectly useless to try to get either Kitty or Bea Habersham
to talk about Marcia," murmured Edith Symmes in Hayden's ear. "They
simply will not do it, and it is sheer waste of breath to ask them any
questions. Now, I h