"Gritzko has gone to telephone for a Tzigane band," Princess Sonia
said. "And to the club and to the reception at Madame Sueboffs, and
soon we shall have enough people for a contre-danse--and some real
fun."

That it was almost three o'clock in the morning never seemed to have
struck anyone!

"Now, tell me everything, Tamara," Lord Courtray said, as they sat down
on one of the big divans. "Give me a few wrinkles. I can see one wants
to comprehend these tent ropes."

"Well, first they are the nicest people you could possibly meet, Jack,"
Tamara said. "And don't imagine because they skylark like this, and sit
up all night, that they aren't most dignified when they have to be.
That is their charm, this sense of the fitness of things. They have not
got to have any pretence like some of us have. Not one of them has a
scrap of pose. They are nice to you because they like you, or they
leave you entirely alone if they do not. And some days when they are
all together they will whisper and titter and have jokes among
themselves, leaving you completely out in the cold--what would really
be fearful ill-manners with us, but it is not in the least, it is just
they have forgotten you are there, and as likely as not you will be the
center of the whispering in the next minute. They are all like
volcanoes with the most beautiful Faberger enamel on the top."

"And the men? I suppose they make awful love?"

"I don't think so," went on Tamara, while she stupidly blushed. "They
all seem to be just merry friends, and the young ones don't go out very