Boston Neighbours In Town and Out

by Agnes Blake Poor

Margaret could have looked forward to all this being over at last, and to night and darkness, and bed for relief; but—here rose again the spectre—what could she write home about it? She could not devise another evasive letter; she must tell the whole truth, and had better have done so at first—for of course she should never, never come to one of these things again. The hands of the great clock crept slowly on; would they never hurry to midnight before the big ball in her throat swelled to choking, and her quivering, burning, throbbing pulses drove her to do something, she could not tell what, to get away and out of it all?

The second figure was over, and she looked across the great hall, wondering if she could not truthfully plead a headache, and go to the cloak-room. But how was she to get there? and what could she do there alone? She would have died on the spot rather than make any appeal to Mrs. Underwood. No, she must go through with it; and then as she looked again, a great, sudden sense of relief came over her, for she saw in the doorway the slouching figure of her friend of Monday. He did not look at her, and she doubted if he saw her; but it was something to have him in the room. In a moment more, however, she saw him speak to Ralph Underwood; and then the latter came up to her and asked if he might present a friend of his, and at her acquiescence, moved away and came up again with "Miss Parke, let me introduce Mr. Smith."

"I am very sorry to say I don't dance," Mr. Smith began, "but I hear that there are more ladies than men to-night; so perhaps if you have not a partner already, you won't mind doing me the favour of sitting it out with me."

Margaret hardly knew what he meant, but she would have accepted, had he asked her to dance a pas de deux with him in the middle of the hall. She took his arm and they walked far down to a place at the very end of the line of chairs; but it did not matter; it was in the crowd.

Mr. Smith did not say much at first; he hung her opera cloak over the back of her chair carefully, so that she could draw it up if she needed it, and somehow the way he did so made her feel quite at home with him, and as if she had known him for a long time; even though she perceived, now that she had the opportunity to look more closely at him, that he was by no means so old as she had at first taken him to be. His hair was thin, and there were one or two deeply-marked lines on his face, but there was something about his figure and motions that gave an impression of youthfulness. Without knowing his age, you would have said that he looked old for it. He was rather undersized than small, having none of the trim compactness that we associate with the latter word, and his face had the dull, thick, sodden skin that indicates unhealthy influences in childhood.

"That was a pleasant party at Mrs. Underwood's the other evening," he began at last.

"Was it?" said Margaret, "I never was at a party before—I mean a party like that."

"And I have been to very few; parties are not much in my line, and when I do go I am generally satisfied with looking on; but I like that very well, sometimes."

"Perhaps," said Margaret ingenuously, "if I had gone only to look on, I should have thought it pleasant too; but I did not suppose one went to a party for that."

"You do not know many people in Boston?"