PART II.
THE COST OF IT.
CHAPTER I.
MRS. JACKSON-CROLY AT HOME.
“Fate’s a fiddler, life’s a dance.”
“O’Rorke’s noble feast will ne’er be forgot
By those who were there, and those who were not.”
It was the day of the Jackson-Crolys’ dance, for which we had in due course received our invitations, gorgeously printed on gilt-edged cards. Willy and I were sitting over the library fire after tea, and had already begun to contemplate the combined horrors of dressing for a ball and eating a half-past six o’clock dinner, when Uncle Dominick stalked in, with a basket in his hand, which he handed to me with a note, saying austerely that one of the Clashmore servants had just ridden over with it.
The note was from Connie.
“My dear Theo,” it began—I had seen a good deal of the O’Neills lately, and Connie and I had arrived at calling each other by our Christian names—“we are sending you over some yellow chrysanthemums, as you said you were going to wear white. Mamma will, of course, be delighted to chaperon you, and thinks you had better come here first, and drive on in our carriage; and we can take you home and put you up for the night, as Willy may want to stay later than you do. Nugent is, I think, very proud of the bouquet. He constructed it himself, and has spent the greater part of the morning over it in the conservatory. Certainly, as far as wire goes, it is all that can be desired; there are at least ten yards of that in it.”
“I should have thought you might have found some flowers for your cousin here, Willy,” remarked Uncle Dominick, while I was reading the letter to myself.