She turned and looked him full in the eyes; and he knew then what he had suspected at first, that she meant to deny that they had ever met before.
He gazed at her calmly, a slow smile twisting his lips, acknowledging her rebuke, and acquiescing silently in her position.
“I’m sure I don’t wish to spoil it. I’m only too happy—to—to be so much honored.”
“There!” she laughed easily. “You can be polite, can’t you? Do you hunt, Mr. Gallatin?” quickly changing the topic to one less personal. “I thought nobody ever dined here unless he was at least first cousin to a Centaur.”
“Oh, no,” he laughed. “Mrs. Pennington isn’t so exclusive as that. But I’m sure she’d have her own hunters in to table if she could. This is quite the liveliest house! Mrs. Pennington is the most wonderful woman in the world, and the reason is that she absolutely refuses to be bored. She likes Centaurs because they’re mostly natural creatures like herself, but she hasn’t any use for Dinosaurs!”
A general movement toward the table, and Jane took Phil Gallatin’s arm and followed. A huge horse-shoe of Beauties formed the centerpiece, from which emerged the Cedarhurst Steeplechase Cup, won three years in succession by Dick Pennington. The decorations of the room were in red and gold, and a miniature steeplechase course was laid around the table with small fences, brush and water jumps, over which tiny equestrians in pink coats gayly cavorted. Miss Loring found to her delight that the neighbor on her other side was Mr. Worthington. At least she was not to be without resource if the situation grew beyond her. But Mr. Gallatin having made token of his acquiescence, gave no sign of further intrusion. His talk was of the people about them, of their ambitions and their lack of them, of motoring, of country houses and the latest news in Vanity Fair, to which she listened with interest, casually questioning or venturing an opinion. The only rôle possible for her was one of candor, and she played it with cool deliberation, carefully guiding his remarks into the well-buoyed channels of the commonplace.
And while he talked amusedly, gayly even, in the glances that she stole at his profile, she found that he had grown thinner, and that the dark shadows under his eyes, which she remembered, were still to be found there. The fingers of his right hand slowly revolved the stem of a flower. All of his wine glasses she discovered he had turned bowl downward. His cocktail he had slowly pushed aside until it was now hidden in the garland of roses which circled the table. She felt quite sorry for him, as she had felt last summer, and now, better attuned to detraction than to praise, her mind and instinct both proclaimed him, in spite of herself—a gentleman. Coleman Van Duyn had lied to her. She was conscious of Coley surveying her from his seat across the table with a jaundiced eye, and this surveillance, while it made her uncomfortable, served to feed the flame of her ire. Coley Van Duyn had lied to her, and the lot of liars was oblivion.
A pause in the conversation when Nina Jaffray’s voice broke in on Mr. Gallatin’s right.
“It isn’t true, is it, Phil?”
He questioned.