"I never give dances away before I get there," she said. "I regard myself as public property on such occasions, and it's a case of 'first come, first served.' It's very unfair to the men who go to dances to find a girl's card full before they have a chance, and I won't do it."
So Chris had got those supper dances, reflected Carlton Mackrell presently, but she had been liberal also to himself, and he was leading her away when the Professor suddenly exclaimed:
"What time is supper?"
"Supper! Why, you've only just got here! What are you thinking about?" exclaimed Gay.
"Supper," Frank Lawless answered mildly, with no intention of being funny.
"You haven't long had your dinner, you greedy old thing," Gay reminded him as she moved away, "but do put your tie straight!"
She never had any trouble in finding the Professor, however big the crowd in which he might be. She had only to look for a tall man standing on one leg in a doorway, with his white tie under his left ear, and there he was.
On the rare occasions when he attended a dance, he possessed his soul in patience till supper-time, when he did ample justice to the good things provided, after which he sought a secluded corner, and went to sleep until such time as Gay was ready to depart.
"You haven't asked me for a dance yet, Frank," said a voice in well-pretended tones of offence behind him, and his meditations—upon supper—being thus rudely interrupted, he turned to make apologies to Lossie, who in spite of her beauty and elegance was never surrounded in a ballroom like Gay.
"Shall we have this one?" she inquired, much to the Professor's surprise and confusion. "Come along"—and before he could remonstrate, she had manÅ“uvred him among the couples waltzing by, and he was executing his old-fashioned steps, precisely if not briskly. After one circuit of the room, accomplished with difficulty, and much bumping against indignant couples, owing to erratic steering, the Professor stopped abruptly and made a rush from the room, dragging Lossie by the arm with him. He subsided upon a couch in an exhausted condition, and producing an enormous red silk handkerchief, mopped his heated brow with it.