The middle space was left pure, unvexed by columns or furnishing.

At the room's far end Amory glimpsed the prince, at his side Olivia's white veil, and her women about her; and, nearer, St.George and Balator in the place appointed.

A guard came to conduct him, and he crossed to his seat and sank down with the look that could be made to mean whatever Amory meant.
"I expect to be served," murmured the journalist in him, "by beautiful tame megatheriums, in sashes.

And is that glyptodon salad ?" St.George's eyes were upon the guests, so tranquilly seated, aware of the hour.
"I fancy," he said in half-voice, "that presently we shall see little flames issuing from their hair, as there used from the hair of the ladies in Werner's ballets." Then as Balator leaned toward him in his splendid leisure, fostering his charm, there came an amazing interruption.
The low key of the room was electrically raised by a cry, loosed from some other plight of being, like an odour of burning encroaching upon a garden.
"Why have you not waited ?" some one called, and the voice--clear, equal, imperious--evened its way upon the air and reduced to itself the soft speech of the others.

Silence fell upon them all, and their eyes were toward a figure standing in the open interval of the room--a figure whose aspect thrilled St.George with sudden, inexplicable emotion.
It was an old man, incredibly old, so that one thought first of his age.