"Fordy" was many times a millionaire, and his handsome intelligent wife
lived the life of her class. But she was far less conservative than any
woman Price had met in San Francisco. Although she was no longer young he
had more than once detected symptoms of a wild and insurgent spirit, and
an impatient contempt for the routine she was compelled to follow or go
into retirement. She was always leaving abruptly for Europe, and every
once in a while she did something quite uncanonical; enjoying wickedly
the consternation she caused among the serenely regulated, and betraying
to the keen eyes of the New Yorker an ironic appreciation of the immense
wealth which enabled her to do as she chose, answerable to no one. Her
husband was uxorious and she had no children. She had seemed to Price
more restless than usual of late and showing unmistakable signs of abrupt
departure. (He was sure she dusted the soles of her boots as she locked
the door of drawing-room A.) Perhaps to-night she might be in a
schismatic mood.

She was standing apart, a tall, dark, almost fiercely haughty woman, but
dressed with a certain arrogant simplicity, without jewels, her hair in a
careless knot at the base of her head. There were times when she was
impeccably groomed, others when she looked as if an infuriated maid had
left her helpless. She was, as Ruyler well knew, a kind and generous
woman (in certain of her moods), with whom the dastardly cradle fates had
experimented, hoping for high drama when the whip of life snapped once
too often. Perhaps she had found her revenge as well as her consolation
in cheating them.

It was evident to Price that she had been snubbing somebody, for a group
of matrons, flushed and drawn apart, were whispering resentfully. Price
Ruyler stood in no awe of her. He could match her arrogance, and he liked
and admired her more than any of his new friends. They quarreled