iers, and diplomats
stood up to dance, and the colonel asked me to join him.

I was ashamed to tell him that I had never danced except with a
schoolgirl, so I took his hand and started. But hardly had we begun,
when I made mistakes, which I thought everybody saw (I am sure Alma saw
them), and before we had taken many turns my partner had to stop,
whereupon I retired to my seat with a forced laugh and a sense of
confusion.

It was nearly twelve when they began the Cotillon, which Alma and my
husband led with supreme self-possession. As one of the hostesses I sat
in the front row of the square, and when I was taken out I made further
mistakes, which also Alma saw and communicated by smiles to my husband.

Before the Cotillon came to an end the night was far spent and then the
company, which had become very boisterous, began to look for some new
excitement, no matter how foolish. One or other started "turkey trot"
and "grizzly bear" and finally Alma, with memories of the winter sports
at St. Moritz, proposed that they should toboggan down the great
staircase.

The suggestion was welcomed with a shout, and a broad board was
immediately laid on the first long flight of stairs for people to slide
on.

Soldiers went first, and then there were calls for the ladies, when Alma
took her turn, tucking her dress under her at the top and alighting
safely on her feet at the bottom. Other ladies followed her example,
with similar good fortune, and then Alma, who had been saying "Such fun!
Such lots of fun!" set up a cry of "Margaret Mary."

I refused at first, feeling ashamed of even looking at such unwomanly
folly, but something Alma said to my husband and something that was
conveyed by my husband's glance at me set my heart afire and, poor
feverish and entangled fool that I was, I determined to defy them.

So running up to the top and seating myself on the toboggan I set it in
motion. But hardly had I done so when it swayed, reeled, twisted and
threw me off, with the result that I rolled downstairs to the bottom.

Of course there were shrieks of laughter, and if I had been in the
spirit of the time and place I suppose I should have laughed too, and
there would have been an end of the matter. But I had been playing a
part, a tragic part, and feeling that I had failed and covered myself
with ridicule, I was overwhelmed with confusion.

I thought my husband would be angry with me, and feel compromised by my
foolishness, but h