The House of Armour

CHAPTER XXIV
AN ANSWERED QUESTION

Trucks, low sleds, and huge wagons emerged in a steady stream from lanes leading down to the wharves, where ships great and small lay moored. Rumbling out of these lanes with much noise and cracking of whips from impatient drivers, these heavy vehicles were a constant menace to unwary passers-by.

Dr. Camperdown having relapsed into a reflective mood had a number of narrow escapes. Jumping aside just in time, he went on his way, brushing heedlessly along by sailors, hoarse-voiced captains of fishing craft who wore bright-colored scarfs around their throats, the few women who appeared in the street, and an occasional shivering child, running with a few cents in its hand to the nearest eating-place for something to supplement a late breakfast.

At frequent intervals he passed by clothing shops, whose dangling garments of oilskin, fur rugs, and woolen wraps formed numerous little arbors in front of their entrance doors. Once a swinging line of rough socks caught in his cap, was impatiently swept aside, and fell to the ice and snow on the pavement. The irate shopkeeper rushed out, and sent a volley of bad language after him, which Camperdown listened to complacently, and then strode on without replying.

At last he arrived in front of the place he sought—a substantial, brick building with Armour & Son, Cobequid Warehouse, in gilt letters across its wide archway.

He wished to go down the wharf to Mr. Armour’s office, and passing under the heads of a pair of mules that were dragging a load of barrels of flour out into the street, he followed a narrow, plank walk at the side of the building, occasionally glancing up as he did so at the rows of barred, prison-like windows above him.

“A more ponderous erection this, than the first one,” he said half aloud. “Wonder how long it will stand? ’Till after poor Stanton is in his grave probably;” and opening a door before him, he stepped into a small passage which gave private entrance to Mr. Armour’s office.

A tap at the door and he was permitted to enter by a curt, “Come in.”

In a good-sized room of moderate height sat the virtual head of the Armour firm, a pen between his fingers, his eye engaged in running up and down the columns of an account book that he held propped up before him.

The doors of the massive safes sunk into the wall, stood half open; inside could be seen in compartments, filed papers, rows of books, and small padlocked boxes. On the wall hung calendars, the signal service system of the port of Halifax, a map of Nova Scotia, and various memoranda relating to the business.

Camperdown approached the heavy table where Mr. Armour sat, and throwing his cap on it, pulled toward him one of the haircloth easy-chairs of the room, and said agreeably as he sat down, “Morning, Stanton. Is business progressing?”

“Yes,” said Mr. Armour, a faint smile hovering about his lips.

He had just received news from his Jamaica agent of the profitable sale of some West Indian cargoes, and was feeling almost cheerful in consequence of it—the making of money being the one ray of sunlight in his joyless existence. However, he did not tell Dr. Camperdown this, and the latter went on:

“There’s a point in the science of killing people, Stanton, that I’d like to have you know. When you tackle me, don’t do it with cold steel, or frost and snow and icy atmosphere. If I’m going to be put out of the world, let me have an easy, comfortable going. Something warm and pleasant.”

“I am at a loss to understand your meaning,” said Armour in a cold voice.

“Drowning is a pleasant death,” went on Camperdown inexorably; “or bleeding; cyanide of potassium kills a cat quickly. You can shoot a dog quicker than you can starve him. More agreeable to the dog too.”

“Your jesting is unintelligible to me.”

“I daresay,” replied Camperdown. “Why don’t you try to make ma’m’selle happier, Stanton?”

Armour scanned him silently.

“She’s eating her heart out about something,” said Camperdown with suspicious smoothness. “Those French people are all fire and suppressed passion. You don’t understand them, Stanton.”

“I have had some experience with French people,” said Armour tranquilly.

“Well you don’t understand women, anyway.”

“And you do.”

“Yes, I know just how to manage them. I know how to do most things. With the boundless conceit of the average man I think I could run the universe. Why don’t you buy ma’m’selle some new gloves, Stanton? I noticed that she had on shabby ones the other day.”

Armour burst into one of his rare and mirthless laughs. “Really, Camperdown, you are hard to suit with regard to this young lady. Is this the fifth or the sixth time that you have interviewed me about her? Would you accept a position as lady’s maid out at Pinewood?”

“No, I wouldn’t,” said his listener with a growl.

“I want to do my duty by her,” said Armour. “She has always had a handsome allowance. I rarely notice a woman’s dress; but she certainly would have attracted my attention had she been imperfectly clad.”

“Do you ever look at her, Stanton?”

“Yes; occasionally.”

“You do not like her?”

“I really cannot see that my feeling toward her matters in the slightest degree,” said Armour evasively. “By the way, now you are here, will you prescribe something for me? I am having insomnia again.”

“Go to bed early; eat more; and when you leave your office leave your business behind you, not take it home and work half the night in your library,” and Dr. Camperdown surveyed his patient in great moodiness. “I won’t give you powders, so you needn’t ask me. You’re breaking natural laws and have been for years. There’ll be a collapse some day.”

Mr. Armour’s quiet self-possession did not leave him, and he returned his friend’s gaze with tranquil eyes.

Something in his glance reminded Camperdown of Stargarde, and a softer mood came over him. “Stanton,” he said, and he stretched one hand across the table, “what is the matter with you?”

Mr. Armour measured him with a glance of calm surprise, and made no answer.

“What is it that happened,” Camperdown went on, “to freeze you, to turn you from a living man to a block of ice—what is it, Stanton?”

Again there was no reply, and his friend continued eagerly:

“You are alive; you eat, drink, sleep, and walk about, yet there is no joy in living. Have you ever heard of the drug ‘curare’?”

Armour shook his head.

“It is much in favor with certain members of my fraternity. They use it, as they say, in the interests of science and for the benefit of mankind. Animals to whom it is administered cannot move or cry out, but their nerves are rendered acutely and intensely sensitive. Sometimes,” softly, “I fancy that you have been curarized, Stanton.”

Armour smiled in rather a ghastly way, and murmured some unintelligible reply.

“By our ancient friendship,” said Camperdown in persuasive accents, “tell me. If you are in trouble, let me share it,” and uneasily getting up as if he could not remain on his seat, he tramped about the office, not noisily, but very gently, and pushing the chairs aside with his foot. “Stanton,” coming and bending over the immovable figure at the table, “I have liked very few men, of them you most of all. When we were lads, I loved you like a girl. I never told you, but the ancient liking has not entirely passed away. I would help you if I could,” and the pent-up emotion of years found expression in a movement that from Brian Camperdown was a tender caress; he stooped down and laid his arm across his friend’s shoulder.

Something of Armour’s immobility gave way. A slight flush rose to his face, and he said huskily: “I am grateful to you, but there is nothing to tell. My business oppresses me.”

“Is that all?” asked Camperdown keenly. “You know it is not. You’re eaten up by some worry; everybody knows it.”

Armour pushed back his chair, and rose suddenly. “Is it as bad as that?” he said hastily. “Am I remarked upon?”

“We don’t see ourselves as others see us. People know that you’re not in a normal condition. Of course they discuss you. Who are you that the rest of the world should be gossiped about and you go scot free? Now you’ll try to mend, won’t you? Throw your burden into the sea. Tell some woman about it, if you won’t trust me. If she loves you, you’ll be supremely happy; if she doesn’t, you’ll be supremely miserable, which is the next best thing. Take that little French girl into your heart, Stanton. Next to Stargarde she comes, sweet and true and gentle, and yet full of fire; just the right qualities for you.”

Armour looked at him in undisguised dismay. “This is wildness; in the name of mercy stop. Have you been propounding this fine scheme to her?”

“Yes; we discuss it often,” said Camperdown, throwing sentiment to the winds and coming back to his accustomed state of irritability; “she’s no more in favor of it than you are; says she had as soon wed a mummy as you. Also that you’ve been detestable to her. Good luck to you in your wooing,” and with a look of unqualified disapprobation he strode to the door, slammed it behind him, and hurried through the streets to his own office, where a formidable array of patients restlessly awaited him.

Left alone Armour glanced about him in an impatient way. As if with mischievous finger the words had been traced on the wall, he saw them staring at him whichever way he turned, “Take the little French girl into your heart; take the little French girl into your heart.” The very air seemed to be ringing with the foolish speech.

“I wish that Camperdown would let me alone,” he muttered irritably. “I shall never marry; if I ever did, she is the last woman in the world that I could or would choose. If he knew everything he would not be so ready with his advice.” Then his face softened. “I wonder what she would say if she could know of this conversation. I have never satisfied myself about that suspicion. I will do so to-day,” and with the air of a man well used to mastering his emotions he set his book up before him again, and was soon busy with the solution of some financial problems in which he had been interrupted by the entrance of his friend.

An hour or two later his man came to take him home to lunch. “I shall not go back so early as usual,” he said, as he left the sleigh at Pinewood. “Come for me half an hour later.”

At the lunch table he did once glance at the place where Vivienne sat quietly eating her baked potatoes and roast beef, and listening with an amused air to Judy’s semi-sarcastic remarks.

Mrs. Colonibel, busy with some thoughts of her own, scarcely spoke, and Colonel Armour and Valentine were not present.

“Will you be good enough to come to the library for a few minutes,” said Armour, letting his blue eyes rest for an instant on Vivienne as they left the table.

With a murmured reply in the affirmative, she passed by him as he held open the door for her.

“He looks as if he were going to scold her,” said Judy turning to her mother. “Do you know whether he thinks that she has been doing anything out of the way?”

“No,” said Mrs. Colonibel, coming out of her reverie; “I don’t; but I know that he scarcely approves of anything that she does. He fairly hates her.”

“Does he?” chuckled Judy with a sly glance at her mother. “She is not afraid of him at any rate. I admire her, mamma—she’s so cool and sweet. Don’t you wish you were like her?” and with an impertinent laugh the girl slipped by her.

“I shall not detain you long,” Armour was saying to Vivienne in the library. “I only want to give you this,” and he took an envelope from his pocket, “and to ask you to pardon me for my thoughtlessness in not handing it to you before.”

Vivienne blushed painfully and put back his proffered hand with the question, “Is it money?”

“It is.”

“I cannot take it,” and she drew a long breath and looked at the door as if she would like to escape from the room.

“Why not?”

“I do not need it.”

He surveyed her in quiet disapprobation. “You are vexed with me because I did not give it to you before. But I forgot that you would still have expenses, though under my roof.”

“No, I am not vexed; but I still have some money left and I cannot take any more from you.”

“Again I ask, why not?”

“Because—because I do not think that it is right for me to do so.”

She was very much disturbed though she controlled herself admirably. In an interested fashion he noted the whiteness and evenness of the teeth pressing nervously against the red rebellious lips to keep them from bursting into speech.

“Pardon me,” he said; “but I like to get at motives. Do you refuse this money because you dislike me so intensely or–”

“Oh, no, no,” she exclaimed, eagerly and protestingly.

“You have avoided me so studiously lately,” he went on, “that really I began to fear it was marked by other people.”

Always that fear of what others would say. Vivienne smiled demurely. “You mistake me; I never felt so grateful to you—not even when I was a little girl and used to carry about a picture of Napoleon because it resembled you.”

“Did you really admire me to that extent?” he said ironically.

“I did.”

“And now you dislike me,” he said with persistence.

“I have told you that I do not, Mr. Armour.”

“You endure me then?”

“No, I do not endure you;” and she laughed outright. “I am, as I said before, intensely grateful to you.”

“She has as many moods as there are hours in the day,” he soliloquized in internal discontent. “I wonder how I had better make my next attempt?”

She spoke first. “Mr. Armour, you said that you brought me here to accomplish a certain purpose, and when it was accomplished I might leave. Has the time not yet come?”

“It has,” he replied with a return to his usual heavy expression. “You may go at any time. My design has been frustrated, as so many of my designs are.”

“I am sorry,” she said, “very sorry, for I know that whatever your purpose was, it was a worthy one.”

“That is a kind thing for you to say,” he responded with unusual animation, “and very fitting. Now you will take this money.”

“I cannot, Mr. Armour, and–”

“You will not,” he said finishing her sentence for her, “not even to gratify me. Well, though you will soon leave me, as I see you plan to do, I shall still have a care of your movements.”

She cast down her eyes. “I will take it,” she said hurriedly. “If you would believe me I would tell you that I am more pained to reject kindnesses from you than you are to have them rejected.”

“Is that the truth?” he asked calmly.

“It is.”

“We shall miss you after you go away,” he went on after he had seen the envelope bestowed in her pocket; “but you, I fancy, will be happy to leave us.”

“No, no, not happy; I shall regret it.”

“You will miss Judy,” he continued; “the other members of the family you are indifferent to.”

She lifted her glowing eyes to his face. There was a method in his way of questioning her, and it effected an immediate change in her manner. “If you have no more to say to me,” she observed quietly, “I will go away.”

“I have nothing more,” he said, “except to make the simple observation that you are free to return here at any time.”

“I shall not return, Mr. Armour.”

The proud sadness of her tone touched him. “You arrogant child,” he exclaimed, “how can you tell? What do you know of life?”

“I know what is right for me to do,” she said almost inaudibly, “and I must not keep you any longer.”

“Stay,” he said, “just for one instant. Till you answer my last question. Judy is the one that you most dread the parting from?”

“Yes, Judy—why not Judy?” she said composedly.

It was not Judy. He saw who it was in every curve of her suddenly erect, defiant figure, in every line of her dark annoyed face as she went quickly away.

“I have not been engaged in a very honorable employment,” he said when he was left alone. “Baiting an innocent girl has not heretofore been one of my pastimes; but I wanted to find out—and she has teased me and braved me as no other woman has ever done. She loves me.” And with a deep flush of gratification he drew on his gloves and left the room. “Hereafter her position in my house will be very different. Perhaps she may not leave us—who knows?” And with a growing conviction in his mind that there were things in the world of more interest than money-making, he drove to his office.

CHAPTER XXV
ZILLA’S ROSEBUD

Miss Zilla Camperdown sat on the top step of the second staircase in the house of her adoption, carefully nursing a small parcel done up in white tissue paper, and watching patiently the closed door of a bedroom beyond her.

At last the door opened, and Dr. Camperdown appeared. “How do I look?” he asked, surveying her with a smile so broad and ample that her small form was fairly enveloped by it.

In speechless delight she caught him by the hand, and leading him back into his room, devoured with her eyes every line of his figure.

“How do I look?” he said again, but the child, as if words failed her to describe the perfection of the sight, waved him toward the full length reflection of himself in the pier-glass between his windows.

He gazed complacently at it, and saw a closely cropped, large, but finely shaped sandy head, a trimmed moustache, and a new suit of evening clothes that fitted admirably his strong and powerfully built figure. “Look like a dandy, Zilla,” he muttered. “Body’s all right, so it doesn’t matter about the ugly face.”

“You’re a bouncer,” she said beatifically. “There’ll not be one like you at the toe-skippin’.”

“At the what, Zilla?” he asked, twisting his neck in order to get a view of his coat tails.

“The dance,” she said hastily. “There’ll be women there, I suppose. Don’t let them run their eyes after you, Dr. Brian.”

“Why not, my child?”

“You might be wantin’—wantin’ to fetch one of them here,” a spasm of jealousy contracting her brows.

He did not notice it, being still intent upon his coat tails. “Suppose I did bring one, Zilla—what would you do?”

“I’d dash vitriol at her,” said the child softly; “then she’d run away.”

He turned sharply to her with the sternest expression upon his face that she had ever seen there. Her words had conjured up a vision of his beloved Stargarde hiding her disfigured features from him, and Zilla gloating over her misery. “Your badness is awful,” he said backing away from her; “it is the badness of big cities. Thank Heaven, we don’t have it here.”

His words were as a spark to inflammable material. Immediately the child fell into a raging passion. Her joy in his affection for her had been so acute that it had almost amounted to pain, and her fury at his annoyance was so intense that she reveled in it with a mad sense of pleasure. She could not speak for wrath, but she returned his gaze with ten-fold interest, and walking deliberately up to the long mirror, she poised the dainty heel of her slipper and sent it crashing through the glass.

He neither spoke nor stirred, though some of the broken glass came falling about the toes of his patent leather shoes.

She caught her breath, flung at him a whole mouthful of her forbidden “swear words,” and sprang at a razor on his dressing table.

At this he started toward her quickly enough, and his hand closed over hers just as she seized the shining steel. She struggled with him like a small wild beast, but her strength was powerless against his. “Drop it! drop it!” he said commandingly; then more kindly, “Put it down, Zilla.”

At the change in his tone she looked up at him, and unclasping her fingers from the handle, allowed the dangerous instrument to slip to the floor.

Still holding the little menacing hands, he sat down and took her upon his knee. “Did you wish to kill me with that razor?” he asked.

“No; myself,” she said with a sob. “I’m tired o’ living.”

Tired of living because she fancied that he had ceased to love her. “Zilla,” he said, “I have a dev—a demon of a temper.”

For answer the child buried her face, as he uneasily reflected, in the glossy bosom of his evening shirt front, and wept as if her heart would break. Yet he did not disturb her, except to pat the back of her head and murmur: “Don’t cry, child—you wouldn’t really be angry with me if I got married, would you, Zilla?” he asked, after her passion seemed somewhat subdued. “You know that I hope to make Miss Turner my wife some day.”

“I would not mind her so much,” said the child reluctantly.

“And you would not do anything to hurt her?”

“No.” And she raised her tear-stained face to assure him that she spoke truly.

“No one has been putting nonsense in your head about my marrying you, Zilla?” uneasily.

“Marry you!” she said in accents of the utmost scorn. “I’m not fit enough, and I’m only a little girl. ’Twould be too long to wait.”

“Far too long,” cheerfully. “We’ll get you a husband when you’re ready for one. Sensible men don’t marry babies, or rather young girls.”

She understood him and smiled comprehendingly. Then she said humbly: “Don’t delay yourself any more—it’s time to go. May I say prayers to you first?”

“Yes,” he replied, gravely subduing his astonishment at this, the first request of the kind that she had made to him. She knelt down by his knee, and pressing her little hot cheek against his hand, repeated devoutly a series of eminently proper and reverential prayers that Mrs. Trotley had taught her, but which, on account of long words, could not possibly convey to her mind any apprehension of their meaning.

At the last of the many “Amens,” she lifted her face and said with unspeakable sadness and humility, “Can I pray an extra?”

“Yes,” he returned, biting his lip; “as many as you please.”

She immediately poured forth one of the heart-felt, childish supplications which the young when in agony of soul will sometimes utter, and to his mingled shame and confusion it was addressed to himself, rather than to the Supreme Deity, who was but a shadowy and mysterious unreality to her.

“Dear Dr. Brian, cut the devil out of my heart and make me like you,” it began, and continued on through his list of virtues—in spite of his recent admission with regard to his temper—and a vehement and longing invocation to be more like him, so that he would not get angry with her.

He did not dare interrupt her, and sat looking at the reflection of his red and confused face in the unbroken part of the mirror opposite.

With a final sob, not dreaming that she had done anything unusual, she quietly put up her cheek for his usual good-night kiss.

“Good-night, dear Zilla,” he said, in a rather tremulous voice. “Will you not call me brother in future, rather than doctor?”

The child stared at him incredulously, then flung her arms around his neck in a choking embrace, murmuring in eager delight, “Brother Brian,” and rushed from the room.

He rubbed his hand over his eyes. “Must try to teach her a simpler prayer,” gruffly. “What’s this, something she’s dropped?” and he picked up the crushed paper parcel on the floor. It contained a little, headless stalk wrapped in silver foil. The rosebud top had rolled under the table in Zilla’s struggle with him. He knew that during the afternoon there had been an excursion made to a distant greenhouse by Mrs. Trotley and Zilla, and had guessed that it was to obtain a boutonnière for him.

“Poor child,” he muttered; “her rosebud shall go to the dance,” and taking it in his well-shaped hands, he, by means of one of his surgeon’s needles and a bit of thread, quickly fastened bud and stalk together and placed them in the silk lapel of his coat.

The coat he took off and laid carefully on the bed, and then proceeded to exchange the shirt blistered by Zilla’s tears for a fresh one.

A quarter of an hour later he was standing in front of the sleigh waiting for him by the pavement and attentively scrutinizing Zilla’s windows. Yes; the curtains were drawn slightly apart. He threw back his topcoat, pointed to the rosebud, and waving his hand to her entered the sleigh.

“By love I have won her, by love I must keep her,” soliloquized Camperdown, as his sleigh traversed the distance between his house and the Arm.

He soon arrived among the vehicles, opened and closed, that were dashing up to Pinewood and depositing their occupants at a side entrance to the house, the large front hall being given up to dancing. By a back stairway he was directed to a dressing room, and joining a stream of people, for Mrs. Colonibel’s dance was in reality a ball, proceeded down the wide staircase to the drawing rooms. Mrs. Colonibel, magnificent in pink satin, was receiving her guests inside the back drawing-room door. Colonel Armour, the handsomest man present, in spite of his snowy hair, was with her, as also was Valentine. Stanton was not visible. Beside Mrs. Colonibel stood Vivienne, dressed as usual in white, and receiving the salutations of the many friends of the house, not with the shy, uncertain manner of the débutante, but rather with the serene and conventional reserve of a woman of the world.

“Both smiling angelically and neither of them enjoying it,” muttered Camperdown, pushing aside the purple train of a lady’s dress with his foot, and stepping behind Mrs. Colonibel. “Solomon in all his glory wasn’t a patch on her,” surveying the back of her elaborately-trimmed gown. “And ma’m’selle hasn’t an ornament. Sensible girl! This is a frightful ordeal for her, this plunge into society in a place that her parents fled from. Far better for Flora to have given her a tea; much more suitable for the coming out of a young girl. That’s what we’ll give Zilla. But I must perform my devoir,” and he fell in behind a group of ladies who were coming up to greet their hostess, followed by the gentlemen of their family.

Mrs. Colonibel’s fascinating smile was met by an encouraging one on his part, and pressing gently the white-gloved hand of the girl beside her, he passed on to make way for another bevy of ladies. Nodding to men acquaintances, and bowing to every woman whose eye he could not escape, he passed through the room and along the verandas, which had been covered in for the evening.

“As gorgeous as the sun at midsummer, Will Shakespeare would say,” he soliloquized. “Light, heat, music, jewels, fine raiment on pretty, painted peacocks, strutting about to show their tails to each other—Flora’s idea of heaven. Wonder if Stargarde is about?” With a wholesome fear of imperiling delicate silks and laces, he cautiously re-entered the hall, lifted up his eyes, and saw Stargarde and Judy bending over the railing of the circular well in the third story of the house. He smiled at them, and in a few minutes they heard his step on the stairway.

“Oh, what a dude!” exclaimed Judy. “Just observe his broadcloth and fine linen, Stargarde, and his boutonnière, and perfume too, I believe; that’s the little wildcat’s doings.”

“Hold your tongue, Judy,” he said shyly, slipping in to rest his arms on the railing between her and Stargarde.

“Oh, but really, you know, it is too overcoming,” said Judy saucily. “And his hair, Stargarde! What have you done with your sandy locks, Brian? Isn’t the back of his head nice?” and she ran her fingers lightly over it. “I’m proud of you, my physician,” and thrusting her hand through his arm, she looked down on the moving groups of people below. “They’re just going to start the dancing; the musicians are in a little room off the library. Stanton had to leave his den for once.”

“Where is he?” interrupted Camperdown.

“Dressing; he was detained in town. Doesn’t the house look nice, Brian? We’ve had a florist here all day. I like the palm grove in the back hall best of all. Mamma must be dead tired. She has been at the thing for a week. Stanton for once let her have all the money she wished. All day she has been fussing about the supper, and watching the thermometers; the house isn’t too warm yet, whatever it may be later; and the men were late in coming to take up the hall carpet. There go the lancers. I wish I could dance.”

Camperdown was not listening to her, being engaged in carrying on a conversation in a low note with Stargarde, who seemed strangely listless and inattentive.

“Stargarde forgot that it was the night of the ball,” said Judy. “She came sauntering out here about six o’clock in that cotton gown, and said that mamma had invited her to something, she didn’t know what, but thought it was a dinner. Isn’t she queer, Brian?”

“Very,” he replied; then to the subject of their remarks. “You look pale; will you sit down?”

She sank obediently into the big chair that he pulled up for her, and he resumed his talk with her.

Judy watched the dancing going on below, and listened to the music as if she were entranced, occasionally hushing Mammy Juniper, who sat on a stool in the corner, rocking herself to and fro and groaning, “O Lord, forgive! Good Lord, pardon!” and similar ejaculations.

“There is Stanton,” exclaimed Judy. “I must speak to him,” and she limped down to the hall below.

“Not bad looking,” she said, critically surveying his calm, well-bred face and heavily built though finely proportioned figure. “Might even pass for a handsome man. Why is it that men always look so well in evening clothes? Stanton,” speaking in a low tone, “when I told Vivienne that your business engagements might keep you in town this evening she looked as if she didn’t care at all.”

“Perhaps she didn’t,” he said coolly.

“Bah—you’re a man! She did care. What did you say the other day to make her angry?”

“Nothing.”

“You did something.”

“No, I did not,” he said quietly; “but really I must refuse to have Miss Delavigne thrust upon me at every turn.”

“Come, look at her and see how lovely she is,” and Judy drew him toward the circular opening in the hall. “Aren’t her bows delicious? Do you see Valentine watching her? He is happy because she is going to dance with him presently, and I don’t believe she wants to, for she is afraid that he is going to get silly over her, just as he has been over other girls.”

“Did she tell you this?”

“No, but I know it. What a pity that you have given up dancing, Stanton.”

“I must leave you,” he said abruptly, and in a few minutes he was moving quietly about among his guests below.