"Good natured? I like that! I am always good natured. You had better go
than to stay and abuse me. But then, as you have been at Mrs.
Staggchase's all the afternoon, you ought to be pretty well talked
out."

The young man turned toward her with an air of mingled surprise and
impatience.

"Who said I had been there?" he demanded.

"It was in the evening papers," she returned, teasingly. "All your
movements are chronicled now you have become a great man."

"Humph! I am glad you were interested in my whereabouts."

"But I wasn't in the least."

"Are you sparring as usual, Miss Mott?" asked Mr. Stewart Hubbard,
joining them. "Good evening, Mr. Rangely."

"Oh, Mr. Hubbard," Miss Mott said, ignoring the question, "I want to
know who is to make the statue of _America_. It is going to stand
opposite our house, so that it will be the first thing I shall see when
I look out of the window in the morning, and naturally I am
interested."

"Mr. Herman is making a study, and Mr. Irons has been put up to asking
this new woman for a model. What is her name? The one whose _Galatea_
made a stir last year."