Miss Linton's party was in full swing when they arrived. It was an
extremely hilarious party, the interest centering about a fat man in a
dress-suit, with a bath towel around his waist, who was attempting to
distil a forbidden elixir from an ingenious condenser of his own
invention.
The studio, under a grimy skylight, was cluttered with bric-a-brac,
animate and inanimate. A Daibutsu in a gilded shrine dominated one
corner, and a handsome woman in a Manchu coat and swinging ear-rings of
jade held court in another. At sight of the Martel group she laid down
the small silver pipe she was smoking, and swam toward them through a
cloud of incense and tobacco smoke.
"Dear old C. M.! Bless his heart!" she cried, kissing Papa Claude
effusively. Then she nodded good-naturedly to Eleanor, and held out a
welcoming hand to Quin.
"Who is this nice boy?" she asked, her languid black eyes sweeping his
face.
"Allow me to present ex-Sergeant Quinby Graham," said Papa Claude
impressively--"a soldier of whom his friends and his country have every
reason to be proud."
Then, to Quin's utter chagrin, he was conscious of the fact that Papa
Claude was giving, in an audible aside, an account of his prowess that
placed him second only to another sergeant whom the world acclaimed its
chief hero.
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