CHAPTER XIV
SOPHIE'S STORY
I had to lay my journal aside last night before I reached the really thrilling occurrence of Thanksgiving day, which was, strangely enough, neither the dinner nor the ball, although each was in its own peculiar way a decided success.
I have Evelyn's word that the ball was a success, for neither Sophie nor I attended it, albeit Richard had, at my whispered suggestion, sent Sophie a box of long white gloves from the city, getting them off on an early train that they might reach her in time; and sending along with this a box of roses—Maréchal Niel for Sophie, La France for Mrs. Chalmers and Evelyn, while for me there was a great sheaf of American Beauties.
But he did not come back in time for the ball, and I suddenly lost all interest in the affair as the last train out from the city that evening failed to bring him. Sophie had been suffering all day with a frightful neuralgic headache, and, as night drew near, it became so much worse that she declared that she could not go to the ball. The lights and dizzy whirling around would be the death of her, she decided, so she dropped down into a chair in the library after dinner and said she would give it up.
"Then I'll stay with you," I volunteered, and, despite her own protestations and feebler ones from Mrs. Chalmers and Evelyn, the matter was thus arranged. There were always far too many girls at such affairs anyway, they all knew, so that my absence would really be a blessing.
Mr. Maxwell came into the room just as the matter had been thus satisfactorily settled and when he heard of the arrangement his face beamed with a kind of mischievous happiness.
"Now, that's what I call luck," he said, as the door closed upon Mrs. Chalmers' retreating form and left us three alone together. "I'll go with the ladies and stay long enough to see that Evelyn's card is filled—then I'll take a sneak, and come on back home to see how the headache is progressing."
His smile spoke immense approval of his own cleverness, but Sophie cut it short.