"You don't know mother!" muttered Ethel Vandergilt.
Grace heard her, and she said, rebukingly, "Yes, absolutely impartial
and--"
"Are you chosen one of the hundred?" asked the wise virgin.
"Yes, I am!" answered Grace, defiantly. "I had nothing to do with it.
This whole affair is exceedingly distasteful to me."
"Of course!" came in a great chorus.
To agree with her in that tone of voice was intolerable.
Grace's hatred shifted from the unspeakable H. R. to these bosom
friends. If it were not that H. R. was always right, she wouldn't
dislike _him_ so much.
"It is not that I mind not being one of the hundred, but the not being
asked to be," muttered the doll face.
It was obviously what all of them minded.
Ethel Vandergilt said: "If I could make my mother resign I'd offer my
services. But she is not the resigning kind. Good-by. I'm crazy to meet
your H. R."
Well, they were welcome to him--if she made up her mind she did not want
him for herself.
The moment the last false friend left, Grace's tolerant smile vanished.
Was she, in sooth, chosen Number One? The papers said it was only a
rumor.