Gerty rose from the circle as he advanced, and moved a single step forward, while the pale green flounces of her train rippled prettily about her feet.

Her hair was loosely arranged, and she gave him an odd impression of wearing what in his provincial mind he called a "wrapper"-- his homely name for the exquisite garment which flowed, straight and unconfined, from her slender shoulders.

His mother, he remembered, not without a saving humour, had always insisted that a lady should appear before the opposite sex only in the entire armour of her "stays" and close-fitting bodice.
Gerty, as she mentioned the names of her callers, subsided with her ebbing green waves into the chair from which she had risen, and held her cigarette toward Trent with a pretty inviting gesture.

Her delicate grace gave the pose a piquant attraction, and he found himself watching with delight the tiny rings of smoke which curled presently from her parted lips.

As she smoked she held her chin slightly lifted, and regarded him from beneath lowered lids with an arch and careless humour.
"If you'd been the Pope himself," she remarked, as an indifferent apology, "I'd hardly have done more than fling the table-cover over my head.