"She never hands you anything but you find a pin hidden in it," went on the girl. "All her remarks are meant to be read backward, and my life is too short to straighten out their kinks. I like a person to say what they mean in plain English, and then I can either like them or not."

"Mostly not," said the Major, grimly; and added, "Anyway, she's beautiful."

"Perhaps," said the other. "So is the Jungfrau; but I prefer something more comfortable."

"What's Chappie de Peyster beauing her around for?" asked Mrs. Venable. "Is he a candidate?"

"Maybe his debts are troubling him again," said Mistress Betty. "He must be in a desperate plight. - Did you hear how Jack Audubon proposed to her?"

"Did Jack propose?" exclaimed the Major.

"Of course he did," said the girl. "His brother told me." Then, for Montague's benefit, she explained, "Jack Audubon is the Major's nephew, and he's a bookworm, and spends all his time collecting scarabs."

"What did he say to her?" asked the Major, highly amused.

"Why," said Betty, "he told her he knew she didn't love him; but also she knew that he didn't care anything about her money, and she might like to marry him so that other men would let her alone."

"Gad!" cried the old gentleman, slapping his knee. "A masterpiece!"

"Does she have so many suitors?" asked Montague; and the Major replied, "My dear boy - she'll have a hundred million dollars some day!"

At this point Oliver put in appearance, and Betty got up and went for a stroll with him; then Montague asked for light upon Miss Hegan's remark.

"What she said is perfectly true," replied the Major; "only it riled Betty. There's many a gallant dame cruising the social seas who has stowed her old relatives out of sight in the hold."

"What's the matter with old Simpkins?" asked tho other.

"Just a queer boy," was the reply. "He has a big pile, and his one joy in life is the divine Yvette. It is really he who makes her ridiculous - he has a regular press agent for her, a chap he loads up with jewellery and cheques whenever he gets her picture into the papers."

The Major paused a moment to greet some acquaintance, and then resumed the conversation. Apparently he could gossip in this intimate fashion about any person whom you named. Old Simpkins had been very poor as a boy, it appeared, and he had never got over the memory of it. Miss Yvette spent fifty thousand at a clip for Paris gowns; but every day her old uncle would save up the lumps of sugar which came with the expensive lunch he had brought to his office. And when he had several pounds he would send them home by messenger!