"Do not take me into consideration at all," I return in a suppressed voice. "Dinner now, or in five hours to come, would be quite the same thing to me."
I move quickly away from him towards mamma as I say this, and, sinking down on the turf very close to her, slip my hand into hers; and as I feel her gentle fingers closing upon mine, a sense of safety and relief creeps slowly over me.
Dinner progresses; and, though I will not acknowledge it, I begin to feel decidedly better. Fragments of conversation float here and there.
"I have a great mind to set my little dog at you," says Bebe, in reply to some flagrant compliment bestowed upon her by the devoted Chips. A little bijou of a dog, with an elaborate collar and beseeching eyes, that sits upon her knee and takes its dinner from her pretty white fingers, is the animal in question.
"Oh, please don't," murmurs Chips, pathetically. "I am so horribly afraid of your little dog. You would not like me to die of nervous excitement, would you?"
"I am not so sure. It would make room for a better man."
"Impossible! There isn't a better fellow going than I am. You ask my mamma when you see her."
"I need not ask anybody; I can see for myself. What do you do all day long but play billiards?"
"I beg your pardon, Miss Beatoun. You estimate my capabilities at a very improper level. I do no end of things besides billiards. I shoot, smoke, eat, and—talk to you."
"What a way to spend one's life!" severely. "I wonder where you think you will go when you die?"