right nice girl, in her way--and mother thinks
I ought to look after her, you see. She thinks I ought to dance a whole
lot with her myself, and stir up other fellows to dance with her--it's
simply impossible to make mother understand you CAN'T do that, you see.
And then about me, you see, if she had her way I wouldn't get to dance
with anybody at all except girls like Mildred Palmer and Henrietta Lamb.
Mother wants to run my whole programme for me, you understand, but the
trouble of it is--about girls like that, you see well, I couldn't do
what she wants, even if I wanted to myself, because you take those
girls, and by the time I get Ella off my hands for a minute, why, their
dances are always every last one taken, and where do I come in?"

Alice nodded, her amiability undamaged. "I see. So that's why you dance
with me."

"No, I like to," he protested. "I rather dance with you than I do with
those girls." And he added with a retrospective determination which
showed that he had been through quite an experience with Mrs. Dowling in
this matter. "I TOLD mother I would, too!"

"Did it take all your courage, Frank?"

He looked at her shrewdly. "Now you're trying to tease me," he said. "I
don't care; I WOULD rather dance with you! In the first place, you're
a perfectly beautiful dancer, you see, and in the second, a man feels a
lot more comfortable with you than he does with them. Of course I know
almost all the other fellows get along with those girls all right; but
I don't waste any time on 'em I don't have to. _I_ like people that are
always cordial to everybody, you see--the way you are."

"Thank you," she said, thoughtfully.

"Oh, I MEAN it," he insisted. "There goes the band again. Shall we?"

"Suppose we sit it out?" she suggested. "I believe I'd like to go out in
the corridor, after all--it's pretty warm in here."

Assenting cheerfully, Dowling conducted her to a pair of easy-chairs
within a secluding grove of box-trees, and when they came to this
retreat they found Mildred Palmer just departing, under escort of a
well-favoured gentleman about thirty. As these two walked slowly away,
in the direction of the dancing-floor, they left it not to be doubted
that they were on excellent terms with each other; Mildred was evidently
willing to make their progress even slower, for she halted momentarily,
once or twice; and her upward glances to her tall companion's face were
of a gentle, almost blushing deference. Never