without rudeness, the crowd so pressing in behind me,
to glance once more up the line. I saw, or thought I saw, just a chance
glance toward where I stood, near the foot of the Row of Mystery, as
they called it. I looked a second time, and then all doubt whatever
vanished.

If this girl in the black laces, with the gold comb in her hair, and the
gold-shot little shoes just showing at the edge of her gown, and the
red rose at her hair, held down by the comb--half hidden by the pile of
locks caught up by the ribbon of the mask--if this girl were not the
mysterious Ellen, then indeed must Ellen look well to her laurels, for
here, indeed, was a rival for her!

I began to edge through the ranks of young men who gathered there,
laughing, beseeching, imploring, claiming. The sparkle of the scene was
in my veins. The breath of the human herd assembled, sex and sex, each
challenging the other, gregarious, polygamous.

I did not walk; the music carried me before her. And so I bowed and
murmured, "I have waited hours for my hostess to present me to Miss
Ellen." (I mumbled the rest of some imaginary name, since I had heard
none.)

The girl pressed the tip of her fan against her teeth and looked at me
meditatively.

"And ours, of course, is _this_ dance," I went on.

"If I could only remember all the names--" she began hesitatingly.

"I was introduced as Jack C., of Virginia."

"Yes? And in what arm?"

"Cavalry," I replied promptly. "Do you not see the yellow?" I gestured
toward the facings. "You who belong to the Army ought to know."

"Why do you think I belong to the Army?" she asked, in a voice whose low
sweetness was enough to impel any man to catch the mask from her face
and throw it down the nearest well.

"You belong to the Army, and to Virginia," I said, "because you asked me
what is my arm of the service; and because your voice could come from
nowhere but Virginia. Now since I have come so far to see you and have
found you out so soon, why do you not confess that you are Miss Ellen?
Tell me your name, so that I may not be awkward!"

"We have no names to-night," she answered. "But I was just thinking;
there is no Jack C. in the _Gazette_ who comes from Virginia and who
wears a captain's straps. I do not know who you are."

"At least the game then is fair," said I, disappointed. "But I promise
you that some time I shall see you face to face, and without masks.
To-morrow--"

"Tut, tut!" she reproved. "There is