Leslie lets her dark gray eyes fall on his handsome upturned face as if she had been recalled to earth.
"Oh, yes," she says. "All women are, are they not? But I do not get much dancing. It is years since I was at a party. My father is not strong, and dislikes going out, and—well, there is no one else to go with me; besides, I should not leave him."
He nods thoughtfully, and some idea of what her life must be dawns upon him.
"You must lead a very quiet life," he says.
Leslie smiles.
"Yes, very, very quiet," she assents.
"What do you do to amuse yourself?" he asks.
Leslie thinks a moment.
"Oh," she says, cheerfully, and without a shadow of discontent in her voice or in her face, "I take walks, when my father does not want me, but he usually likes me to stay with him while he is painting; and sometimes William takes me for a sail, and there is the piano. My father likes me to play while he is at work; but when he does not I read."
"And is that all?" he says, raising himself on his elbow that he may better see her face.