“Hi, Roy, is that you? Where have you been? I have been searching for you everywhere. Put on your dancing pumps and come over to our villa. We are going to have a carpet dance. All the tables and chairs have been put out on the lawn, and we are going to have a jolly time. Come on.”
The speaker over the hedge was Andrew Garrett, Roy's cousin, whose father had rented the adjoining villa for the summer. Garrett was on the road, seated in a stylish dogcart. He held a pair of white ribbons over a mettlesome horse whose silverplated harness ornaments shone brightly in the moonlight.
“You must make my excuses——”began Roy.
“Eh! what? Oh! come! that won't do. My sisters have netted a lot of girls, many of whom are already there, and the cry is 'still they come.' We haven't enough partners for them. I am not slow at this kind of affair, but, you know, a fellow can't make himself ubiquitous. Run and put on your dancing-shoes, and if you spoil them in the dew
coming home, I'll buy you another pair to-morrow.”
“The puppy,” thought Roy, and the ugly word was on the tip of his tongue, but he checked himself in time, and said:
“I am sorry indeed to disappoint you, but I have more important things to think about to-night. I really can not come. You must make my excuse to auntie and your sisters.”
“Oh! hang it all, man; we haven't enough dancers,”
“I am sorry, but to-night——”
“Sorry!——” We regret to say that Garrett used an expression not at all becoming to the lips of a Catholic young man.