Certes the provocation was excessive. She was looking surpassingly beautiful this evening, in creamy white, with a velvety rose of deepest crimson on her breast; another bud, a white one, nestling among the thick coils of her bronze-tinted dark hair. Many a glance of astonished admiration greeted her entrance, and followed her about the room; but the quiet repose of the lovely face was devoid of the least sign of self-consciousness.
“By Jove!” remarked Armitage to his partner, a chubby little “bunch” with big blue eyes and a button mouth. “Claverton’s a sly dog. That’s why he was in no hurry to begin. Oho, I see now.”
“She is pretty. How well they look together!” was the reply, as the two stood against the wall to watch them.
Ethel, whirling by with the Civil Commissioner’s clerk, caught the last remark. She would have given much to have been able to box poor little Gertie Wray’s ears severely, then and there. That young lady babbled on, utterly void of offence.
“I say, though,” said her partner. “She cut you out. Claverton was just on his way to ask you when she came in. He was, really.”
“Was he? Then he should have asked me before. My programme’s full now.”
Meanwhile let us follow the pair under discussion.
“Who was that poor old man you were chaffing so, just now?” Lilian was saying.
“Only a curious specimen of natural history. But how do you know I was chaffing anybody?”
“Because I heard you. Who is he?”