"
"I shouldn't have believed you," he answered, smiling.
"Conceit!" she exclaimed.
He shook his head.
"In a sense, of course, I am conceited," he replied. "I am the happiest
and proudest man here. I really think that after all we ought to turn it
into a celebration."
The band was playing a waltz. Naida's head moved to the music, and
presently Nigel rose to his feet with a smile, and they passed into the
ballroom. Karschoff and Mrs. Bollington Smith watched them with
interest.
"Naida is looking very wonderful to-night," the latter remarked. "And
Nigel, too; I wonder if there is anything between them."
"The days of foreign alliances are past," Karschoff replied, "but a few
intermarriages might be very good for this country."
"Are you serious?" she asked.
"Absolutely! I would not suggest anything of the sort with Germany, but
with this new Russia, the Russia of which Naida Karetsky is a daughter,
why not? Although they will not have me back there, Russia is some day
going to lay down the law to Europe."
"I wonder whether Maggie has any ideas of the sort in her mind," Mrs.
Bollington Smith observed. "She seems curiously abstracted to-night."
Chalmers came grumblingly up to Mrs. Bollington Smith, with whom he was
an established favourite.
"Lady Maggie is treating me disgracefully," he complained. "She will
scarcely dance at all. She goes around talking to every one as though it
were a sort of farewell party.
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