"Go on and tell him the rest of it," urged Cooley.

"About Lady Mount-Rhyswicke," said Cornish, "it seems strange enough,
but she has a perfect right to her name. She is a good deal older than
she looks, and I've heard she used to be remarkably beautiful. Her third
husband was Lord George Mount-Rhyswicke, a man who'd been dropped from
his clubs, and he deserted her in 1903, but she has not divorced him. It
is said that he is somewhere in South America; however, as to that I do
not know."

Mr. Cornish put the very slightest possible emphasis on the word "know,"
and proceeded:

"I've heard that she is sincerely attached to him and sends him money
from time to time, when she has it--though that, too, is third-hand
information. She has been _declasse_ ever since her first divorce. That
was a 'celebrated case,' and she's dropped down pretty far in the world,
though I judge she's a good deal the best of this crowd. Exactly what
her relations to the others are I don't know, but I imagine that she's
pretty thick with 'em."

"Just a little!" exclaimed Cooley. "She sits behind one of the lambkins
and Helene behind the other while they get their woolly wool clipped. I
suppose the two of 'em signaled what was in every hand we held, though
I'm sure they needn't have gone to the trouble! Fact is, I don't see why
they bothered about goin' through the form of playin' cards with us
at all. They could have taken it away without that! Whee!" Mr. Cooley
whistled loud and long. "And there's loads of wise young men on the
ocean now, hurryin' over to take our places in the pens. Well, they can
have _mine_! Funny, Mellin: nobody would come up to you or me in the