." She was speaking of her dress. "Aileen wouldn't
help me--the mean thing!"

Aileen had swept on to Cowperwood and his mother, who was near him. She
had removed from her arm the black satin ribbon which held her train and
kicked the skirts loose and free. Her eyes gleamed almost pleadingly
for all her hauteur, like a spirited collie's, and her even teeth showed
beautifully.

Cowperwood understood her precisely, as he did any fine, spirited
animal.

"I can't tell you how nice you look," he whispered to her, familiarly,
as though there was an old understanding between them. "You're like fire
and song."

He did not know why he said this. He was not especially poetic. He had
not formulated the phrase beforehand. Since his first glimpse of her
in the hall, his feelings and ideas had been leaping and plunging like
spirited horses. This girl made him set his teeth and narrow his eyes.
Involuntarily he squared his jaw, looking more defiant, forceful,
efficient, as she drew near.

But Aileen and her sister were almost instantly surrounded by young men
seeking to be introduced and to write their names on dance-cards, and
for the time being she was lost to view.

Chapter XVIII

The seeds of change--subtle, metaphysical--are rooted deeply. From the
first mention of the dance by Mrs. Cowperwood and Anna, Aileen had been
conscious of a desire toward a more effective presentation of herself
than as yet, for all her father's money, she had been able to achieve.
The company which she was to encounter, as she well knew, was to be so
much more impressive, distinguished than anything she had heretofore
known socially. Then, too, Cowperwood appeared as something more
definite in her mind than he had been before, and to save herself she
could not get him out of her consciousness.

A vision of him had come to her but an hour before as she was dressing.
In a way she had dressed for him. She was never forgetful of the times
he had looked at her in an interested way. He had commented on her hands
once. To-day he had said that she looked "stunning," and she had thought
how easy it would be to impress him to-night--to show him how truly
beautiful she was.

She had stood before her mirror between eight and nine--it was
nine-fifteen before she was really ready--and pondered over what she
should wear. There were two tall pier-glasses in her wardrobe--an unduly
large piece of furniture--and one in her closet door. She stood befo