"Hammersmith," said Florizel, "I may leave the champagne to you."

And with that he turned away and began to go round among the
guests. Accustomed to play the host in the highest circles, he
charmed and dominated all whom he approached; there was something
at once winning and authoritative in his address; and his
extraordinary coolness gave him yet another distinction in this
half maniacal society. As he went from one to another he kept both
his eyes and ears open, and soon began to gain a general idea of
the people among whom he found himself. As in all other places of
resort, one type predominated: people in the prime of youth, with
every show of intelligence and sensibility in their appearance, but
with little promise of strength or the quality that makes success.
Few were much above thirty, and not a few were still in their
teens. They stood, leaning on tables and shifting on their feet;
sometimes they smoked extraordinarily fast, and sometimes they let
their cigars go out; some talked well, but the conversation of
others was plainly the result of nervous tension, and was equally
without wit or purport. As each new bottle of champagne was
opened, there was a manifest improvement in gaiety. Only two were
seated - one in a chair in the recess of the window, with his head
hanging and his hands plunged deep into his trouser pockets, pale,
visibly moist with perspiration, saying never a word, a very wreck
of soul and body; the other sat on the divan close by the chimney,
and attracted notice by a trenchant dissimilarity from all the
rest. He was probably upwards of forty, but he looked fully ten
years older; and Florizel thought he had never seen a man more
naturally hideous, nor one more ravaged by disease and ruinous
excitements. He was no more than skin and bone, was partly