He looked sardonic. "Love to see me beaten!" he said.

She put out a quick hand. "Of course not! You will beat him easily. You
are always on the top. Do try!"

He smiled a little, and turned from her. She saw him approach Warden and
tap him on the shoulder.

Warden wheeled sharply, so sharply that the drink he held splashed over
the edge of the glass. The excitement in the room was dying down. She
watched the two men with an odd breathlessness, and in a moment she
realized that everyone else present was watching them also.

Then they both turned towards her, and through a great singing that
suddenly arose in her ears she heard Adela whisper excitedly, "My dear,
he is actually going to introduce that amazing person to us!"

She sat up with a stiff movement, feeling cold, inanimate, strangely
impotent, and in a moment he was standing before her with Fletcher, and
she heard the latter introduce her as his "affianced wife."

Mutely she gave him her hand. It was Adela who filled in the gap, eager
for entertainment, and the next moment Warden had turned to her, and was
talking in his careless, leisurely fashion. The ordeal was past, her
pulses quieted down again. Yet she realized that he had not addressed a
single word to her, and the conviction came upon her that not thus would
he have treated one who was a total stranger to him.

Because of Fletcher, who remained beside her, she forced herself to join
in the conversation, seconding Adela's urgent request that the two men