Both young men admitted that this field had been left unexplored by
either of them.

It was during a lull, when the talk had fallen to the desultory, that
the hall door opened, and Laura came in. Her cheeks glowed like the
sunny side of a Persian peach; her eyes sparkled; between her moist red
lips there was a flash of firm, white teeth; the seal-brown hair
glinted a Venetian red--for at that moment she stood in the path of the
sunshine which poured in at the window--and blown tendrils in
picturesque disorder escaped from under her hat.

The three men rose hastily; the father with pride, Fitzgerald with
gladness, and Breitmann with doubt and wonder and fear.




CHAPTER VIII

SOME BIRDS IN A CHIMNEY

It might be truthfully said that the tableau lasted as long as she
willed it to last. Perhaps she read in the three masculine faces
turned toward her a triangular admiration, since it emanated from three
given points, and took from it a modest pinch for her vanity. Vain she
never was; still, she was not without a share of vanity, that vanity of
the artless, needing no sacrifices, which is gratified and appeased by
a smile. It pleased her to know that she was lovely; and it doubled
her pleasure to realize that her loveliness pleased others. She