The chatter of many voices and the rhythm of dancing feet, the strains
of a string-band in the distance, and, piercing all, the clear, high
notes of a flute, filled the spring night with wonderful sound. Lady
Blythebury had turned her husband's house into a fairy palace of
delight. She stood in the doorway of the ballroom, her florid face
beaming above her Elizabethan ruffles, looking in upon the gay and
ever-shifting scene which she had called into being.

"I feel as if I had stepped into an Arabian Night," she laughed to one
of her guests, who stood beside her. He was dressed as a court jester,
and carried a wand which he flourished dramatically. He wore a
close-fitting black mask.

"There is certainly magic abroad," he declared, in a rich, Irish brogue
that Lady Blythebury smiled to hear. For she also was Irish to the
backbone.

"You know something of the art yourself, Captain Sullivan?" she asked.

She knew the man for a friend of her husband's. He was more or less
disreputable, she believed, but he was none the less welcome on that
account. It was just such men as he who knew how to make things a
success. She relied upon the disreputable more than she would have
admitted.

"Egad, I'm no novice in most things!" declared the court jester, waving
his wand bombastically. "But it's the magic of a pretty woman that I'm
after at the present moment. These masks, Lady Blythebury, are uncommon
inconvenient. It's yourself that knows better than to wear one. Sure,