“The hotel children have the ball-room from eight until nine,” Dell had explained, “then the young folks swarm in. Don’t worry about being too young, Nancy. You look like a young lady in that stunning rig.”
The “rig” was stunning, even Nancy conceded that, for it was a flame-colored chiffon robe that fell down straight from her shoulders, sleeveless, and with the fashionable high neck. Her dark hair set the flame color off beautifully, as did the glints of her dark eyes, and she really did look lovely. This costume was one of Lady Betty’s presents.
Whether a girl was fourteen or nineteen no one could tell, for the bobbed heads were so much alike and so ineffably youthful, everyone looked very young indeed.
The hotel was fascinating to Nancy; its great posts and pillars flanked with baskets of growing vines, the spectacular lights set all over the ceilings, and the music!
It was a scene of gaiety such as Nancy had never before witnessed, and when Gar had danced with her and had then taken her out to the great porch to see the lake illuminations, Nancy Brandon felt like a girl in a dream. Summer life at a fashionable resort was to her like a page from a book, or a scene in a play.
“But I’d die if I had to stay at a hotel,” Gar assured her as she commented upon the grandeur. “It’s all right once in a while, but you would hate this artificial living as a regular diet.”
Nancy agreed that she might, but she also expressed her interest in a sample like this. Rosa had a wonderful time also, the best part of it being the number of compliments she received.
“Wasn’t she getting thin!”
The dance ended early for the Durand party, as Dell was a practical chaperon, and she insisted upon returning to the hills at a reasonable hour. But the memory of that first night stayed in Nancy’s mind just as she remembered her own little party in the Whatnot Shop last year.
Only Ted and her mother had been there to make that first one really complete.