“Five.”
“What a lot! I’ve only one, and it’s quite enough. How many uncles have you?”
“I haven’t got an uncle.”
“I have—a splendid one. Do any of your aunts paint?”
“Auntie Maude does.”
“What does she paint?”
“I don’t know.”
He felt this conversation so stupid that he looked at her in disgust. What was it about girls? Why was there something the matter with all of them? If this was what dances were, he didn’t want any more of them. And it was just then, at that most distressing moment, that the wonderful, the never-to-be-forgotten event occurred. Someone was coming down from the stairs above them and wanted to pass them.
A voice said softly: “Do you mind? Thank you so much.”
Jeremy rose and then looked up. He was staring at the most beautiful lady he had ever conceived of—indeed, far more than he had ever conceived of, because his dreams had not hitherto been of beautiful ladies. He had never thought of them at all. She was very tall and slender, dressed in white; she had black hair and a jewel blazing in the front of it. But more than everything was her smile, the jolliest, merriest, twinkliest smile he had ever seen. He could only smile too, standing against the banisters to let her pass. Perhaps there was something in his snub nose, and the way his mouth curled at the corners that struck her. She stopped.