Cropsie followed his glance: “Oh, that's the new Mrs. Queerington,—the wife of John Jay, you know.”
“But I mean the young girl going through the door there, with the wonderful hair, and the profile?”
“That's Mrs. Queerington. Isn't she a stunner? Everybody's talking about her to-night. I'll introduce you if you like.”
Horton followed him around the outer edge of the dancers, still confident that Cropsie had made a mistake. But when he was duly presented there was no longer room for doubt.
“I hope I'm not too late to claim a dance,” he said. “I always make it a point to dance but once during an evening, and that with the most beautiful woman on the floor. I hope you aren't going to let these young sharks cut me out of my dance?”
Miss Lady lifted a pair of sparkling, excited eyes to his. From the moment when she had appeared, half timidly in her borrowed feathers and taken refuge under Mrs. Sequin's experienced wing, she had been the sensation of the evening. Adroitly conveyed from one group to another she had left enthusiasm in her wake. She was evidently enjoying to the utmost the novelty of receiving homage from one black-coated courtier after another, and of hearing delightful things about herself. The only apparent drawback to her pleasure was when she was compelled to say as she did now:
“Thank you ever so much, but I'm not dancing.”
“Not dancing?” repeated Mr. Horton, not unmindful of the whiteness of her shoulders against the dark marble of a neighboring pedestal,—'"Why not?”
“The Doctor and I have given up dancing.”
“Oh, so he doesn't allow you to dance?”