She found her maid gone, and Mademoiselle waiting to help her undress.  Mademoiselle often did that.  It made her feel still essential in Lily’s life.

“A long seance!” she said.  “Your mother told me to-night.  It is Newport?”

“He wants me to go.  Unhook me, Mademoiselle, and then run off and go to bed.  You ought not to wait up like this.”

“Newport!” said Mademoiselle, deftly slipping off the white and silver that was Lily’s gown.  “It will be wonderful, dear.  And you will be a great success.  You are very beautiful.”

“I am not going to Newport, Mademoiselle.”

Mademoiselle broke into rapid expostulation, in French.  Every girl wanted to make her debut at Newport.  Here it was all industry, money, dirt.  Men who slaved in offices daily.  At Newport was gathered the real leisure class of America, those who knew how to play, who lived.  But Lily, taking off her birthday pearls before the mirror of her dressing table, only shook her head.

“I’m not going,” she said.  “I might as well tell you, for you’ll hear about it later.  I have quarreled with him, very badly.  I think he intends to lock me up.”

“C’est impossible!” cried Mademoiselle.

But a glance at Lily’s set face in the mirror told her it was true.

She went away very soon, sadly troubled.  There were bad times coming.  The old peaceful quiet days were gone, for age and obstinacy had met youth and the arrogance of youth, and it was to be battle.

CHAPTER XVII

But there was a truce for a time.  Lily came and went without interference, and without comment.  Nothing more was said about Newport.  She motored on bright days to the country club, lunched and played golf or tennis, rode along the country lanes with Pink Denslow, accepted such invitations as came her way cheerfully enough but without enthusiasm, and was very gentle to her mother.  But Mademoiselle found her tense and restless, as though she were waiting.

And there were times when she disappeared for an hour or two in the afternoons, proffering no excuses, and came back flushed, and perhaps a little frightened.  On the evenings that followed those small excursions she was particularly gentle to her mother.  Mademoiselle watched and waited for the blow she feared was about to fall.  She felt sure that the girl was seeing Louis Akers, and that she would ultimately marry him.  In her despair she fell back on Willy Cameron and persuaded Grace to invite him to dinner.  It was meant to be a surprise for Lily, but she had telephoned at seven o’clock that she was dining at the Doyles’.

It was that evening that Willy Cameron learned that Mr. Hendricks had been right about Lily.  He and Grace dined alone, for Howard was away at a political conference, and Anthony had dined at his club.  And in the morning room after dinner Grace found herself giving him her confidence.