"What ho! The—engagement?" he demanded abruptly.
"There isn't any engagement," said my Husband with a somewhat vicious stab at the fire.
From his snug, speculative scrutiny of the storm outside, George Keets swung round with what quite evidently was intended to be a warning frown.
"Mr. Kennilworth has—defaulted," he murmured.
"Defaulted!" grinned Rollins. Then with perfectly unprecedented perspicacity his roving glance snatched up suddenly the unmistakable tremor of the May Girl's chin. "Oh, what nonsense!" he said. "There are plenty of other eligible men in the party!"
"Oh, but you see—there are not!" laughed Paul Brenswick. "Mr. Delville and I are Married—and our wives won't let us."
"Oh, nonsense!" grinned Rollins. Once again his roving glance swept the company.
Everybody saw what was coming, turned hot, turned cold, shut his eyes, opened them again, but was powerless to avert.
"Why, what's the matter with trying Allan John?" grinned Rollins.
The thing was inexcusable! Brutal! Blundering! Absolutely doltish beyond even Rollins's established methods of doltishness. But at last when everybody turned inadvertently to scan poor Allan John's face—there was no Allan John to be scanned. Somewhere through a door or a window—somehow between one blink of the eye and another—Allan John had slipped from the room.