She lounged into the drawing-room, smiling her slow, cool smile.
In the big, uncarpeted alcove, where stood Natalie's great painted
piano, Marion Hayden was playing softly, carefully posed for the
entrance of the men. Natalie was sitting with her hands folded, in
the exact center of a peacock-blue divan. The others were knitting.

"Very pretty effect, Toots!" Audrey called. And Miss Hayden gave
her the unashamed smile of one woman of the world to another.

Audrey had a malicious impulse. She sat down beside Natalie, and
against the blue divan her green gown shrieked a discord. She was
vastly amused when Natalie found an excuse and moved away, to
dispose herself carefully in a tall, old-gold chair, which framed
her like a picture.

"We were talking of men, my dear," said Mrs. Haverford, placidly
knitting.

"Of course," said Audrey, flippantly.

"Of what it is that they want more than anything else in the world."

"Children-sons," put in Mrs. Mackenzie. She was a robust, big
woman with kindly eyes, and she was childless.

"Women!" called Toots Hayden. She was still posed, but she had
stopped playing. Mrs. Haverford's eyes rested on her a moment,
disapprovingly.