"Come in," calls Florence gently.
"I have just stopped for a moment to express the hope that you are not ill, dearest," says smooth-tongued Dora, advancing toward her. "How early you left us! I shouldn't have known how early only that Mr. Dynecourt told me. Are you sure you are not ill?"
"Not in the least, only a little fatigued," replied Florence calmly.
"Ah, no wonder, with your exertions before the dancing commenced, and your unqualified success! You reigned over everybody, darling. Nobody could hope even to divide the honors of the evening with you. Your acting was simply superb."
"Thank you," says Florence, who is not in bed, but is sitting in a chair drawn near the window, through which the moonbeams are flinging their pale rays. She is clad in a clinging white dressing-gown that makes her beauty saint-like, and has all her long hair falling loosely round her shoulders.
"What a charming evening it has been!" exclaims Dora ecstatically, clasping her hands, and leaning her arms on the back of a chair. "I hardly know when I have felt so thoroughly happy." Florence shudders visibly. "You enjoyed yourself, of course?" continues Dora. "Everyone raved about you. You made at least a dozen conquests; one or half a one—" with a careful hesitation in her manner intended to impress her listener—"is as much as poor little insignificant me can expect."
Florence looks at her questioningly.
"I think one really honest lover is worth a dozen others," she says, her voice trembling. "Do you mean me to understand, Dora, that you have gained one to-night?"
Florence's whole soul seems to hang on her cousin's answer. Dora simpers, and tries to blush, but in reality grows a shade paler. She is playing for a high stake, and fears to risk a throw lest it may be ventured too soon.
"Oh, you must not ask too much!" she replies, shaking her blonde head. "A lover—no! How can you be so absurd! And yet I think—I hope—"