auty was impressive, but a courageous optimism was
shining out through her eyes. It was in her laugh, her mood. She would
never be afraid.

The dance began after ten, and Eugene danced with first one and then
another--Angela, Mrs. Dale, Mrs. Stevens, Miss Willy. When the third set
came he went looking for Suzanne and found her talking to another young
girl and two society men.

"Mine, you know," he said smilingly.

She came out to him laughing, stretching her arm in a sinuous way, quite
unconscious of the charming figure she made. She had a way of throwing
back her head which revealed her neck in beautiful lines. She looked
into Eugene's eyes simply and unaffectedly, returning his smile with one
of her own. And when they began to dance he felt as though he had never
really danced before.

What was it the poet said of the poetry of motion? This was it. This was
it. This girl could dance wonderfully, sweetly, as a fine voice sings.
She seemed to move like the air with the sound of the two-step coming
from an ambush of flowers, and Eugene yielded himself instinctively to
the charm--the hypnotism of it. He danced and in dancing forgot
everything except this vision leaning upon his arm and the sweetness of
it all. Nothing could equal this emotion, he said to himself. It was
finer than anything he had ever experienced. There was joy in it, pure
delight, an exquisite sense of harmony; and even while he was
congratulating himself the music seemed to hurry to a finish. Suzanne
had looked up curiously into his eyes.

"You like dancing, don't you?" she said.

"I do, but I don't dance well."

"Oh, I think so!" she replied. "You dance so easily."

"It is because of you," he said simply. "You have the soul of the dance
in you. Most people dance poorly, like myself."

"I don't think so," she said, hanging on to his arm as they walked
toward a seat. "Oh, there's Kinroy! He has the next with me."

Eugene looked at her brother almost angrily. Why should circumstances
rob him of her company in this way? Kinroy looked like her--he was very
handsome for a boy.

"Well, then, I have to give you up. I wish there were more."

He left her only to wait impatiently for the sixth and the tenth. He
knew it was silly to be interested in her in this way, for nothing could
come of it. She was a young girl hedged about by all the conventions and
safeguards which go to make for the perfect upbringing of girlhood. He
was a man past the peri