“I expect yours is that tart kind like they have with fried sole, Norah,” laughed Dick Stamford, who had been on intimate terms with them all since he was in petticoats.
“Haven’t got any,” said Norah. “Nor you, either, Mrs. Stamford; have you?”
“Not a scrap,” said Mrs. Stamford, thinking she was speaking the truth. “Still—it’s nice in Elizabeth,” and she patted the girl’s round arm.
“I am not at all sentimental,” said Elizabeth with indignation. “Sentiment is so squashy!”
“I don’t know,” said Mr. Atterton, quite unexpectedly. “I’ve a sort of idea that—well, that sentiment is the thing that makes it all seem worth while, you know.”
“Oh, if father begins to get sentimental, I’ve done,” said Norah, laughing. “Come on, Elizabeth.”
So the two young ladies followed Mrs. Atterton and Mrs. Stamford through the open door, and after a very brief interval the whole party went into the ballroom.
The usual pianist provided for the class had been supplemented by a violin, and the Lancers were being danced in rather a frozen manner when Mrs. Atterton entered.
“Delighted to see you,” she said to the village schoolmaster, who also acted as dancing-master and choir-master, teacher of singing and mender of broken clocks—a person of such extraordinary energy that no wonder he seemed to be made of wire and India rubber, instead of the ordinary materials, and had never found time to get married.
“The pleasure is mutual,” said Mr. Willie Kirke, bowing; he always prided himself on having the right word ready. “I trust your—er—back is fairly well?”