that held the Pierrette who was his wife: "Dead, poor fellow!"

"Dead, poor Clarence!" said Mrs. Prince, magnificent as Queen
Elizabeth, as she and Elinor Vanderwall went downstairs. She had
once danced a fancy dance with him more than twenty years ago.
"Awful!" said Elinor, shuddering.

After the last guest was gone Warren telephoned to the hospital,
Rachael, a little tired and pale in the Indian costume, watching
and listening tensely. She was sick at heart. Even into the
library, where they stood, the Mardi-Gras disorder had penetrated:
a blue silk mask was lying across Warren's blotter, a spatter of
confetti lay on the polished floor, and on the reading table was a
tray on which were two glasses through whose amber contents a lazy
bubble still occasionally rose. The logs that had snapped in the
fireplace were gone, only gray ashes remained, and to Rachael, at
least, the room's desolation and disorder seemed to typify her own
state of mind.

She could tell from Warren's look that he found the whole matter
painful and distasteful to an almost unbearable degree; on his
handsome serious face was an expression of grim endurance, of hurt
yet dignified protest against events. He did not blame her, how
could he blame her? But he was suffering in every fibre of his
sensitive soul at this sordid notoriety, at this blatant voicing
of a hundred ugly whispers in a matter so closely touching the
woman he loved.

"Dead?" Rachael said quietly, when his brief conversation was
over.