As the glasses were large, and I was unused to more than half a glass at a time, I felt what I had imbibed glowing over my system. A warm flush came into my face, and the mercury of excitement went up several degrees.
After we had exhausted all the cut and dried toasts, and all the studied things had been said, we were thrown back upon our own originality. Markham then proposed that we sing the old song of Vive la Compagnie, toasting each other in turn, while the man who was toasted must reply by a distich of the song.
Ellerton immediately rose with a brimming glass in his hand and said:
“A good idea, Markham, and to commence I propose, gentlemen, Mr. Smith, the block on which Miss Carrover sharpened the blade of her coquetry.”
I felt the blood surge to my temples and a harsh retort rise to my lips, but I controlled myself, as the chorus paused for my reply, and sang:
“The block will be happy to sharpen a bit
What so much needs edge, as the gentleman’s wit.”
Amid cries of Good! good! we drank again, with a noisy “Vive la, vive la, vive l’amour!”
Others were then proposed, and with each toast my glass was filled. And now the first effects of the wine began to be felt. I became conscious of a slight unsteadiness of vision, and found that when I attempted to look at any object my eyes went past it like the pendulum of a clock, then went back again, so that I had to move them several times before I could concentrate on what I wished to see. Even then my sight was not very clear, for the lamps had misty rings around them, and when I reached out my hand for my glass I had to make an effort or two before I could touch it. The table, too, seemed to have a wave or elevation in the middle, and the wall on the opposite side of the room was not exactly perpendicular. My consciousness, too, was an unreal consciousness, as if I were dreaming of all these surroundings, and this uncertainty of vision somewhat confused me in ideas and actions. Remembering how much wine I had taken, a sudden fear came over me that I might be a little intoxicated, and with the thought an intense desire to conceal it. The best way to conceal it, I said to myself, is to talk on and convince them that nothing is the matter with me. Markham was sitting next to me and I resolved to speak to him of Lillian, for I was afraid that Ellerton’s remark had produced the impression on his mind that I had been jilted.
“I say, Mis’er Mar’c’um,” I said, leaning much more heavily on his shoulder than I intended, “you did’n think I loved Lill’yun the most, did y’r? Ellert’n was only jok’n. B’cause I got’s much’s she did in that game. Umph? Don’t you think so. Umph? Say, don’t you think so? Umph?”