"So you have. But be consoled. She will sing again later on."
Leaning back, Luttrell takes a survey of the room. It is crowded to excess, and brilliant as lights and gay apparel can make it. Fans are flashing, so are jewels, so are gems of greater value still,—black eyes, blue and gray. Pretty dresses are melting into other pretty dresses, and there is a great deal of beauty everywhere for those who choose to look for it.
After a while his gaze, slowly traveling, falls on Cecil Stafford. She is showing even more than usually bonny and winsome in some chef-d'œuvre of Worth's, and is making herself very agreeable to a tall, lanky, eighteenth century sort of man who sits beside her, and is kindly allowing himself to be amused.
An intense desire to go to her and put the fifty questions that in an instant rise to his lips seizes Luttrell; but she is unhappily so situated that he cannot get at her. Unless he were to summon up fortitude to crush past three grim dowagers, two elaborately-attired girls, and one sour old spinster, it cannot be done; and Tedcastle, at least, has not the sort of pluck necessary to carry him through with it.
Cecil, seeing him, starts and colors, and then nods and smiles gayly at him in pleased surprise. A moment afterward her expression changes, and something so like dismay as to cause Luttrell astonishment covers her face.
Then the business of the evening proceeds, and she turns her attention to the singers, and he has no more time to wonder at her sudden change of countenance.
A very small young lady, hidden away in countless yards of pink silk, delights them with one of the ballads of the day. Her voice is far the biggest part of her, and awakens in one's mind a curious craving to know where it comes from.
Then a wonderfully ugly man, with a delightful face, plays on the violin something that reminds one of all the sweetest birds that sing, and is sufficiently ravishing to call forth at intervals the exclamation, "Good, good!" from Luttrell's neighbor.
Then a very large woman warbles a French chansonnette in the tiniest, most flute-like of voices; and then——
Who is it that comes with such grave and simple dignity across the boards, with her small head proudly but gracefully upheld, her large eyes calm and sweet and steady?