"It's Deirdre," she said, as if for her the end of the world had come.
"Yes," he breathed.
He could hear Deirdre laughing and chattering with the men and girls who had been to school with her when she and the Schoolmaster lived in the hills. The Schoolmaster had gone out of doors again; but where he had been, a long, black-browed drover of Maitland's, Conal—Fighting Conal—was standing, leaning against the wall and smiling down on her. Beneath the inexplicable exhilaration, the tingling, thrilling joy which possessed Davey, a slow wrath surged, at the way Conal looked and smiled at Deirdre, and at the way she looked—her eyes leaping up to his—and smiled at Conal. But she was his, his sweetheart, and had promised to marry him, Davey told himself, and the resurgent joy at seeing her flooded him.
"Aren't you going to dance, Davey?" Jess asked anxiously, when Pat began to fiddle again.
"No," he said.
"If you're not going to get-up, can I have this one with Jess?" asked Buddy Morrison with restrained eagerness.
"What?" Davey asked, his eyes on Deirdre.
"If you're not getting-up, can I have this one with Jess?" repeated Bud Morrison. His sun-scorched face and ruddy hair was responsible for his youthful appearance although he was older by a couple of years than Davey.
He was Jess's most humble adorer, but his grief was that she would never look at him if Davey was looking at her.
"Oh, yes," Davey replied.