West looked injured. “You’re laughing at me now, aren’t you?”
“It’s very hard to take you seriously sometimes, Mr. West.”
West apparently did not notice the suggestion of satire in Helen’s voice. He did show impatience, however, at the interruption that took place as soon as Helen had spoken.
“Here she is! Everybody is looking for you, Auntie! Uncle Douglas is out on the terrace with Mr. Stone, and there’s a whole raft of people waiting to say good-night in the drawing-room and in the hall.”
Fanny Wallace made a pretty picture as she stood half-hidden by the foliage. Her faithful attendant waited in the background.
Helen rose and turned to West, who offered his arm. “Shall we go? I’m afraid I’m behaving very badly to-night,” she said.
VI
In the drawing-room Douglas Briggs found Stone standing disconsolate in a corner. The Boss was plainly out of his element. The politicians who stood near him either had no personal acquaintance with him or belonged to the opposition party. One of these, indeed, the white-haired Senator from Virginia, had recently made a bitter attack on him in a magazine article. It was the first attack that had persuaded Stone to break silence under censure, and the bitterness of his reply showed how deeply he had been hurt. He seemed now to be ostentatiously unconscious of his enemy’s presence; but when the host appeared his face assumed a look of intense relief.
“I’ve been looking all over the place for you,” said Briggs, fibbing, as he often did, to cover a momentary embarrassment. The presence of Jim Stone in his house on so conspicuous an occasion, had caused him considerable perturbation. He knew, however, that the Boss had come out of personal friendliness and as a mark of special favor.