because he must prepare himself to enter the counting-room of his father.
But the evening before she left, Mrs. Newt gave a little party for Mrs.
Plumer, of New Orleans. So Miss Grace, of whom his mother had written
Abel, and who was just about leaving school, left school and entered
society, simultaneously, by taking leave of Madame de Feuille and making
her courtesy at Mrs. Boniface Newt's.

Madame de Feuille's was a "finishing" school. An extreme polish was
given to young ladies by Madame de Feuille. By her generous system they
were fitted to be wives of men of even the largest fortune. There was
not one of her pupils who would not have been equal to the addresses of
a millionaire. It is the profound conviction of all who were familiar
with that seminary that the pupils would not have shrunk from marrying
a crown-prince, or any king in any country who confined himself to
Christian wedlock with one wife, or even the son of an English duke--so
perfect was the polish, so liberal the education.

Mrs. Newt's party was select. Mrs. Plumer, Miss Grace Plumer and the
Magots, with Mellish Whitloe, of course; and Mrs. Osborne Moultrie, a
lovely woman from Georgia, and her son Sligo, a slim, graceful gentleman,
with fair hair and eyes; Dr. and Mrs. Lush, Rev. Dr. and Mrs. Maundy, who
came only upon the express understanding that there was to be no dancing,
and a few other agreeable people. It was a Summer party, Abel said--mere
low-necked muslin, strawberries and ice-cream.

The eyes of the strangers of the gentler sex soon discovered the dark,
rich face of Abel, who moved among the groups with the grace and ease of
an accomplished man of society, smiling brightly upon his friends, bowing
gravely to those of his mother's guests whom he did not personally know.