"Why not?" asked Ethel. She was the best-gowned woman in the United States. And she was _ex-officio hors concours_.
Grace Goodchild felt the stare of twenty pairs of eyes of differing degrees of brightness, but of the same degree of unbelief. They irritated her by flattering her. No woman can concentrate when watched by other women. Grace, therefore, was compelled to live up to the rôle which society had assigned to her, whether she liked it or not.
When you tell a man he is wise and ask for advice, he looks as wise as he can and answers ambiguously. When you tell a woman you don't believe her she indignantly tells you the truth.
"One of the reasons"--she spoke very sweetly--"is that he said my friends would ask me to do it but he did not wish me to add to his troubles."
The girls were listening with their very souls, for this was inside news.
Grace went on: "The commission will be absolutely impartial--"
"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."
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.
Suppose she was not Number One, after all? Supposing the commission--
"I could kill him!" she hissed, and left the room.
Frederick came to her. "Miss Goodchild, there are five reporters waiting to see you."
"Say I'm not at home!" Then she called the man back. "Ask them what they want," and went up-stairs to her room.