"And did these ladies of the 'old guard' speak kindly of the
white-haired traitress?"

"They were careful. But I gathered that Lady Sellingworth had been for
years and years one of those who go on their way chanting, 'Let us eat,
drink and be merry, for to-morrow we die.' I gathered, too, that her
efforts were chiefly concentrated on translating into appropriate action
the third 'let us.' But that no doubt was for the sake of her figure
and face. Lady Archie said that the motto of Lady Sellingworth's life
at that period was 'after me the deluge,' and that she had so dinned it
into the ears of her friends that when she let her hair grow white they
all instinctively put up umbrellas."

"And yet the deluge never came."

"It never does. I could almost wish it would."

"Now?"

"No; after me."

He looked deep into her eyes, and as he did so she seemed deliberately
to make them more profound so that he might not touch bottom.

"It's difficult to think of an after you," he said.

"But there will be, I suppose, some day when the Prince of Wales wears
a grey beard and goes abroad in the winter to escape bronchial troubles.
Oh, dear! What a brute Time is!"