d round Kitty Fisher, to discuss the coming German and
pick up a few hints touching the promised new figures. Wych
Hazel had just passed, escorted on either hand: her dark-blue
robe and white laces setting her off to perfection. For a
minute eyes alone were busy.

'That girl provokes me to death with her high dresses!' said
Kitty Fisher. 'Such ridiculous nonsense!'

'I'm not so sure as to that,' said Miss May. 'Dick raves about
it.'

'Dick raves about her altogether,' said Kitty,--'so of course
he has to include her dress.'

'Well, George said that other shoulders might as well retire
if her's ever came fairly out,' said little Molly Seaton, who
was taking her first sips of society, and looked up to Miss
Kennedy as the eighth and ninth wonder of the world combined.

'I don't care,' said Kitty Fisher, 'I'll have 'em out! I vow I
will. It's a fraud on society.'

'Society can afford to be a loser now and then,' said Mr.
Kingsland, softly insinuating himself among the ladies;--'it
gets so much more than its due between whiles!'

'It's prudish,' said Phinny, disregarding this sentiment,--
'that's what it is. Do you suppose it's that old wretch of a
guardian keeps her in leading strings? Now she talks of not
staying to the German.'

'The Sorceress is in one of her moods to-night,' said Mr.
Kingsland. 'Murky. Flashes coming so thick and fast, that I
declare I've been winking all the evening.'

'Stephen,' said Miss Kitty, 'if you'll help get up the
"Handkerchief" by and by, and get her into the thick of it
before she knows where she's going, I'll give you the first
pair of blue gloves I can spare.'

'Great offer,' said Mr. Kingsland; 'but to-night the Sorceress
prefers walking.'

'Stuff!--who cares what she prefers?'

'Some nine-tenths--and a fraction--of all the men here,--myself
included,' said Mr. Kingsland.

'You are the fraction, or you'd manage it,' retorted Kitty.
'It's doubtful if she _would_ dance with _you_.'

'She will not dance with anybody this night,' said Mr.
Kingsland.

'How do you know?'

'Said so. And what Miss Kennedy has said, she does.'

'Why, she _couldn't_ dance in that long train,' said Molly
Seaton.

'Little goose!' said Kitty Fisher, 'she would hang _that_ over
her partner's arm.'

'Would she!' said Mr. Kingsland, with a slight whistle. 'I
asked her to do it once: I think I shall not again.'

'She'd rather talk to six men than dance with one, I suppose,'
said Miss Fisher