Ladies Must Live

								

adored Christine Fenimer. Of all girls in the world it was
essential that Christine should marry money. This man, Max Riatt,
new to the fashionable world, ought to be comparatively easy game.
The thing ought to go on wheels. But Mrs. Almar herself was not
indifferent to six feet of splendid masculinity; nor without her
own uses at the moment for a good-looking young man.
In other words, there was going to be a contest; in the full
sight of the little public that really mattered, the lists were
set. Nobody present, except perhaps Wickham, who was dangerously
ignorant of the world in which he was moving, doubted for one
moment that Miss Fenimer had resolved to marry Max Riatt, if, that
is, he turned out to be actually as per the recommendations of Mrs.
Ussher; nor was it less certain that Mrs. Almar intended that he
should be hers.
Of course if Mrs. Ussher had been absolutely single-minded, she
would not have invited Mrs. Almar to this party; but though a warm
friend to Christine Fenimer, Laura was not a fanatic, and the
piratical Nancy was her friend, too.
Mrs. Almar could have pleaded an additional reason for her wish to
interfere with this match, besides the natural one of not wishing
Miss Fenimer to attain any success; and that was the fact that
Edward Hickson, her brother, had wanted for several years to marry
Christine. Hickson was a dull, kindly, fairly well-to-do young
man--exactly the type you would like to see your rival marry.
Hickson had motored out with his sister, and had received some
excellent counsel on the way.
“Now, Ned,” she had said, “don’t cut your own throat by being an
adoring foil. Don’t let Christine grind your face in the dust, just
to show this new man that she can do it.”
“You don’t do Christine justice,” he had answered, “if you think
she would do that.”
His sister did not reply. She thought it would have been doing the
girl injustice to suppose that she would do anything else.
They were still sitting about the tea-table at a quarter to seven,
when Christine and Mrs. Almar rose simultaneously. It was almost
time for the arrival of Riatt, and neither had any fancy for
meeting him save at her best--in all the panoply of evening dress.
“We’re not dining till a quarter past eight, my dears,” said Mrs.
Ussher.
Both ladies thought they would lie down before dinner. And here
chance took a hand. Riatt’s train was late, whereas Christine’s
clock was fast. And so it happened that she came downstairs just as
he was coming up.
There had been no one to greet him. He was told by the butler
that Mrs. Ussher was dressing, that dinner would be in fifteen
minutes; he started to bound up the stairs, following the footman
with his bags, when suddenly looking up the broad flight he saw a
blond vision in white and pearls coming slowly down. He hoped that
his lower jaw hadn’t fallen, but she really was extraordinarily