“The remark was not only intended to be complimentary, but positively gushing,” replied Aunt Helen, returning with a smile the glance of their hostess, the stiff Miss Van Ploon. “After two weeks of the gayest season I have ever witnessed, you are as fresh and vivacious as when you started.”
“It’s a return to first principles,” stated Gail, considering the matter seriously. “I’ve discovered the secret of success in New York, either commercial or social. It is to have an unbreakable constitution.”
The dapper little marquis, who was laying a very well conducted siege for the heart and hand of Miss Van Ploon, leaned over Gail’s velvet shoulder and whispered something in her ear. Gail leaned back a trifle to answer him, her deep brown eyes flashing up at him, her red lips adorably curved, that delicate colour wavering in her cheeks; and Mrs. Davies, disregarding entirely the practised luring of the dapper little marquis, who was as harmless as a canary bird, viewed Gail with admiration.
Houston Van Ploon, surveying Gail with pride, made up his mind about a problem which he had been seriously considering. Gail Sargent, taken point by point, appearance, charm, manner, disposition and health, had the highest percentage of perfection of any young woman he had ever met, an opinion in which his father and sister had agreed, after several solemn family discussions.
Nicholas Van Ploon leaned over to his daughter.
“She has dimples,” he catalogued, nodding his round head in satisfaction and clasping his hands comfortably over his broad white evening waistcoat.
Dick Rodley irrupted into the box with Lucile and Arly, just as Thais started for the convent, and they were only the forerunners of a constant stream which, during the intermission, came over to laugh with Gail, and to look into her sparkling eyes, and exchange repartee with her, and enjoy that beauty which was like a fragrance.
Who was the most delighted person in the Van Ploon box? Aunt Helen Davies! She checked off the eligibles, counting them, estimating them, judging the exact degree in which Gail had interested them, and the exact further degree Gail might interest them if she chose.
Gail, standing, was a revelation to-night, not alone to Nicholas Van Ploon, who nearly dislocated his neck in turning to feast his gaze on her in numb wonder, but to Aunt Helen herself. Gail wore an Egyptian costume, an absurdly straight thing fashioned like a cylinder, but which, in some mysterious and alluring way, suggested the long, slender, gracefully curving lines which it concealed. The foundation colour was tarnished gold, on which were beaded panels in dark blue stones, touched here and there with dull red. Encircling her small head was an Egyptian tiara, studded in the front with lapis lazuli and deep red corals, with one great fire opal glowing in the centre; and her shining brown hair was waved well below the ears, and smoothly caught under around the back of her perfect neck. On her cheeks and on her lips were the beautiful natural tints which were the envy and despair of every pair of lorgnette shielded eyes, but on her eyelashes, as part of her costume, Gail had daringly lined a touch of that intense black which is ground in the harems of the old Nile.
“You’re the throb of the evening, sweetheart,” Dick Rodley laughed down at her, as they stood at the door of the box with the function passing in and out.