Billy laughed, good-naturedly. "I didn't say he wasn't sick, did I? But you don't have to trail around after him nursing him; he's plenty old enough, and ugly enough to take care of himself."
"Billy Watts! You are perfectly horrid!"
"Oh, come on, Arethusa, and stop getting all up in the air over nothing!" He took hold of her again, but she jerked angrily away. "Don't be a goose," he added, "everybody in the room's looking at you!"
"I don't care a bit if they are!"
"Do you want me to run out and look up your sick friend and hold his head or anything? I will, if it'll please you very much! Because I sure didn't mean to set you off like this! Come on now, Arethusa, and be a better sport!"
This offer to go look after the suffering Mr. Bennet, although of a wording hardly as respectful as she considered seemly, mollified Arethusa to the extent of finishing out this dance with Billy. But it was not at all necessary that he actually carry out his offer when the dance was really over, for just as the last strains of music were sounding, Mr. Bennet re-appeared from the direction of the hall.
Arethusa left Billy abruptly, standing open-mouthed in the middle of the floor at the suddenness of her departure, and without a single word of apology for leaving him, to greet Mr. Bennet with outstretched hands and anxious inquiry into the state of his immediate physical being. The answer was reassuring and one calculated to raise her spirits. Mr. Bennet believed he felt much better. Arethusa beamed.
"Do you want to dance this with me?" asked Mr. Bennet, then; for just at that very moment the music started once more.
"Do you feel well enough to be dancing?" Anxiety and solicitude were in voice and manner.
"Yes, indeed. It seems to me I haven't danced with you to amount to anything this evening. And I couldn't let it all slip by that way. What's the use of being here with you, if other men have all the pleasure?"