He quite forgot who, what and where he was. There was a somebody talking
to him—a very awful and bony young lady, but she faded so completely out
of the general scheme of his immediate present that all the use he made of
her was to stare over her head at the distant apparition that was become,
now and forever, his All in All. The distant apparition had not lied when
she had told him up in her brother’s room that she too, looked "nice" when
dressed for dinner. Only the word "nice" was as watered milk to the
champagne of her appearance. She was gowned superbly and her throat and
arms were half bared by the folds of silvered lace; her hair fitted into
the back of her neck in the smoothest mass of puffs and coils, and the
curl on her forehead was more distracting than ever.

(Married!)

She seemed to be speaking to everyone, and everyone seemed to be crowding
around her. He couldn’t go up like everyone else, because the awful and
bony young lady was talking hard at him and heightened her charms with a
smile that took up two-fifths of her face, and wrinkled all the rest.

Her name was Lome—Maude Lome. He knew that she must be a relative without
being told, because otherwise she wouldn’t have been invited at all.
Anyone could divine that.

"Oh, isn’t dear Betty just lovely?" this fearful freak said. "I think
she’s just too lovely for anything! She’s my cousin, you know; we’re often
mistaken for one another."

"I can well believe it," said Jack, heavily, not ceasing to stare beyond
as he said it.