She mounted the steps and was bowed into the hall. No question was asked. Servants took charge of her and directed her. She mounted the stairs, found herself in a room with a number of women, who glanced at her indifferently. A maid took her wrap. In this security she lingered as long as she could find excuse—putting off the moment when she must descend.... An elderly woman was leaving the room, and Carmel, quick to grasp opportunity, left in her wake, keeping close to her on the stairs. Side by side they entered the ballroom—as if they were together. Carmel regarded the elderly dame as her ticket of admission.
The orchestra was playing a fox trot; the room was vivid with color.... She paused, searching for the man she had come to see, but could not discover him.... Summoning what assurance she could, she entered the room and skirted it, her eyes on the dancers. She paused, looking for a seat.
At the end, beyond the orchestra, was an alcove, and she moved toward it, entered it. Here was an observation post. She turned to find a chair from which she could watch the ballroom, and as she did so a man entered from a door at the left. Her hands flew to her breast and she choked back a scream.
She was face to face with Abner Fownes!
CHAPTER XIX
CARMEL was astonished at herself; she discovered herself to be cool and self-possessed; determined rather than frightened. Here was an emergency; her one thought was to prove adequate to it.... It was a thing to have been expected. Abner Fownes’s face reassured her—it informed her intuition rather than her intelligence. It wore an expression such as would have been more suitable to one in Carmel’s position—an interloper in danger of being detected and ejected from the house. His eyes were something more than startled or surprised. They were unbelieving. She saw it was hard for him to comprehend her presence; that, for some reason, it was inconceivable she could be there. She knew, through some psychic channel, that it was not the fact of her being at the Governor’s function which nonplused him, but rather the fact of her not being somewhere else—in some spot where he had expected confidently she would be.
His face mirrored the sensations of a man whose plans have gone wrong unbelievably. He was angry, almost frightened, at a loss. She took command of the situation before his moment of weakness passed.
“Good evening, Mr. Fownes!” she said.
“G-good evening!” he answered. “What—how——” Then he smirked and drew himself up to the full realization of his stature. He resumed character. “I did not know,” he said, pompously, “that you were an acquaintance of the Governor’s.”
“May it not be possible,” Carmel said, sweetly, “that there are a number of things you do not know?”