the world, to press her wistful
little nose just once against some dazzling toy-shop window.

With her fingers groping at last into the actual shutters of that
coveted ballroom window, she scrunched her eyes up perfectly tight for
an instant and then opened them, staring wide at the entrancing scene
before her.

"O--h!" said little Eve Edgarton. "O--h!"

The scene was certainly the scene of a most madcap summer carnival.
Palms of the far December desert were there! And roses from the near,
familiar August gardens! The swirl of chiffon and lace and silk was
like a rainbow-tinted breeze! The music crashed on the senses like
blows that wasted no breath in subtler argument! Naked shoulders
gleamed at every turn beneath their diamonds! Silk stockings bared
their sheen at each new rompish step! And through the dizzy mystery of
it all--the haze, the maze, the vague, audacious unreality,--grimly
conventional, blatantly tangible white shirt-fronts surrounded by
great black blots of men went slapping by--each with its share of
fairyland in its arms!

"Why! They're not dancing!" gasped little Eve Edgarton. "They're just
prancing!"

Even so, her own feet began to prance. And very faintly across her
cheek-bones a little flicker of pink began to glow.

Then very startlingly behind her a man's shadow darkened suddenly,
and, sensing instantly that this newcomer also was interested in the
view through the window, she drew aside courteously to give him his
share of the pleasure. In her briefest glance she saw that he was no
one whom she knew, but in the throbbing witchery of the moment he
seemed to her suddenly like her only friend in the world.

"It's pretty, isn't it?" she nodded toward the ballroom.

Casually the man bent down to look until his smoke-scented cheek
almost grazed hers. "It certainly is!" he conceded amiably.

Without further speech for a moment they both stood there peering into
the wonderful picture. Then altogether abruptly, and with no excuse
whatsoever, little Eve Edgarton's heart gave a great, big lurch, and,
wringing her small brown hands together so that by no grave mischance
should she reach out and touch the stranger's sleeve as she peered up
at him, "I--can dance," drawled little Eve Edgarton.

Shrewdly the man's glance flashed down at her. Quite plainly he
recognized her now. She was that "funny little Edgarton girl." That's
exactly who she was! In the simple, old-fashioned arrangement of her
hai