old khaki uniform
upstairs. I wondered if it were one Sidney had worn in camp in Texas
days when his jealous rage was piling up against Eagle. It seemed to me
that there must be an evil influence hanging about those clothes of his;
and I was still thinking this when Major Vandyke, Father, Diana, and
Kitty and I were bunched together, a rather silent party, in Di's big,
roomy town car, spinning from Park Lane to the Russian Embassy with
Kitchener's "night lights" fanning long white arms across the sky of
unnaturally darkened London.

As it was supposed to be a small, informal dinner, we arrived promptly
on the hour; and when Princess Sanzanow--a beautiful, tall woman, with
the mysterious, sad eyes of the Slav people--had greeted us, she said
that four of her guests had still to arrive: Count and Countess
Stefanovitch, and two others whose presence was to be the surprise of
the evening. "I will tell you only _this_," she laughed, in her pretty
English, when Di pretended to be wildly curious; "like Stefan they have
both come back from the front, and they are the most exciting heroes! I
won't dream of spoiling my great _coup_ by letting you guess their names
until they are announced; but this you shall know, dear Lady Diana: my
two 'surprises' are to have the honour of taking you and our bride in to
dinner. All the other women will be envying you both."

Di was pleased and interested. She realized that our hostess meant to
pay her, as well as Milly, a great compliment; for those "other women"
of whom the princess spoke were important socially, and charming in
themselves. What she had called a "small, informal dinner" would be made
up of twenty-two guests; and the informality would consist in the
innovation of having small tables.

The princess introduced me to a very young youth, her son, who had been
away at Eton when I had visited at the embassy before. He began at once
to air his grievance of lacking a year of the age when a man can be
allowed to serve his country; and I was sympathizing with him because he
was not fighting when Milly and her husband were announced. She was
looking prettier than I had ever seen her, with quite new airs and
graces of a married woman and a countess; and Stefan, though extremely
plain of face and insignificant of figure, was interesting because of
his experiences, his limp, and his right arm in a black silk sling.

Milly seemed to think that she and her husband were the guests of the
ev