A few forgot her past and admitted her claim.

Those who did not she ignored....
Then there was Lord Ronald Engleton, an orphan brought up in Paris, a would-be decadent, a dabbler in all modern iniquities, redeemed from folly only by a certain not altogether wholesome cleverness, yet with a disposition which sometimes gained for him friends in most unlikely quarters.

He had excellent qualities, which he did his best to conceal; impulses which he was continually stifling.
By his side sat Forrest, the Sphynx, more than middle-aged, a man who had wandered all over the world, who had tried many things without ever achieving prosperity, and who was searching always, with tired eyes, for some new method of clothing and feeding himself upon an income of less than nothing a year.

He had met the Princess at Marienbad years ago, and silently took his place in her suite.

Why, no one seemed to know, not even at first the Princess herself, who thought him chic, and adored what she could not understand.