t? It was more--it was an epoch in Charlotte's
life--it was the first time she had waltzed with a man. What a
difference between the fervent clasp of Percy's arm and the cold, formal
contact of the mistress who had taught her! How brightly his eyes looked
down into hers; admiring her with such a tender restraint, that there
could surely be no harm in looking up at him now and then in return.
Round and round they glided, absorbed in the music and in themselves.
Occasionally her bosom just touched him, at those critical moments when
she was most in need of support. At other intervals, she almost let her
head sink on his shoulder in trying to hide from him the smile which
acknowledged his admiration too boldly. "Once round," Percy had
suggested; "once round," her mother had said. They had been ten, twenty,
thirty times round; they had never stopped to rest like other dancers;
they had centered the eyes of the whole room on them--including the eyes
of Captain Bervie--without knowing it; her delicately pale complexion
had changed to rosy-red; the neat arrangement of her hair had become
disturbed; her bosom was rising and falling faster and faster in the
effort to breathe--before fatigue and heat overpowered her at last, and
forced her to say to him faintly, "I'm very sorry--I can't dance any
more!"

Percy led her into the cooler atmosphere of the refreshment-room, and
revived her with a glass of lemonade. Her arm still rested on his--she
was just about to thank him for the care he had taken of her--when
Captain Bervie entered the room.

"Mrs. Bowmore wishes me to take you back to her," he said to Charlotte.
Then, turning to Percy, he added: "Will you kindly wait here while I
take Miss Bowmore to the ballroom? I have a word to say to you--I will
return directly."

The Captain spoke with perfect politeness--but his face betrayed him. It
was pale with the sinister whiteness of suppressed rage.

Percy sat down to cool and rest himself. With his experience of the
ways of men, he felt no surprise at the marked contrast between Captain
Bervie's face and Captain Bervie's manner. "He has seen us waltzing,
and he is coming back to pick a quarrel with me." Such was the
interpretation which Mr. Linwood's knowledge of the world placed
on Captain Bervie's politeness. In a minute or two more the Captain
returned to the refreshment-room, and satisfied Percy that his
anticipations had not deceived him.

CHAPTER VI.

LOVE.

FOUR d