"Madame Sorrel," supplemented Mrs. Adams.

"She's fearfully independent," Mrs. Lloyd contributed; "but she's
good. She made your pink, didn't she, Sue? Wayne said she did."

Mrs. Adams turned pink herself; the others laughed suddenly.

"Oh, you naughty girl!" Mrs. White said. "Did you tell Wayne you got
that frock in Santa Paloma?"

"What Wayne doesn't know won't hurt him," said his wife. "Sh! Here
they come!" And the conversation terminated abruptly, with much
laughter.

Mrs. Burgoyne's dinner-party dispersed shortly after ten o'clock, so
much earlier than was the custom in Santa Paloma that none of the
ordered motor-cars were in waiting. The guests walked home together,
absorbed in an animated conversation; for the gentlemen, who were
delighted to be getting home early, delighted with a dinner that, as
Wayne Adams remarked, "really stood for something to eat, not just
things passed to you, or put down in dabs before you," and delighted
with the pleasant informality of sitting down in daylight, were
enthusiastic in their praise of Mrs. Burgoyne. The ladies differed
with them.

"She knows how to do things," said Parker Lloyd. "Old Von Praag
himself said that she was a famous dinner-giver."

"I don't know what you'd say, Wayne," said Mrs. Adams patiently, "if