"These accidents will occur in spite of caution on the part of the best managers of suitable marriages. By far the larger proportion of the shocks inflicted upon polite circles arise from this very cause. Pygmalion grows weary of wooing his statue, and wants sympathy in his disappointment and loneliness."
The dance was ended. The fantastic variations of the waltz were exchanged for a noble march—pealing through the heated rooms like a rush of the healthful sea-breeze. The spark died in Sarah's eye. Her voice took its habitual pitch.
"I have permitted myself to become excited, and, I am afraid, have said many things that I had no right to think—much less to utter. If my freedom has displeased you, I am sorry."
"The error—if error there were—was mine," rejoined Philip. "I led the conversation into the channel; you, after awhile, followed. I believe there is no danger of our misunderstanding each other."
"Darby and Joan! good children in the corner!" cried Lucy, flushed with exercise and radiant with good humor, as she promenaded past them leaning on the arm of a young West Pointer, a native Southerner and an acquaintance of Philip's. If his wife must flirt and frolic, he was watchful that she did not compromise him by association with doubtful characters. On several occasions, the advances of gay gentlemen, whose toilets were more nearly irreproachable than their reputations, had been checked by his cool and significant resumption of the husband's post beside the belle, and, if need existed, by the prompt withdrawal of the unwilling lady from the scene. The cadet laughed, and, convinced that she had said a witty thing, Lucy swam by.
"The common sense of our tropes, rodomontades, and allegories is this!" said Philip, biting his lip, and speaking in a hard tone. "The only safe ground in marriage is mutual, permanent affection. You meant to convey the idea that if each of these dressy matrons, humming around our ears, had a sincere, abiding love for her husband—and each of these gallant benedicts the right kind of regard for his wedded Beatrice, the vocation of us corner censors would be gone?"
"Well said, Mr. Interpreter!" she responded, in affected jest.
"This point settled, will you take my arm for a turn through the room before the next set is formed? They are talking of quadrilles. I shall claim your promise if a set is made up, unless you are not courageous enough to brave the public sneer by dancing with your brother. Come, Jeannie, and walk with us."
Two sets of quadrilles were arranged at different ends of the saloon. Philip led Sarah through one, with Lucy—who considered it a capital joke—and her partner vis-a-vis to them, Jeannie, meanwhile, remaining by her mother.
The summer nights were short; and, when the dance was over, Sarah intimated to her younger sister the propriety of retiring. Mrs. Hunt's head ached, and she esteemed the sacrifice comparatively light, therefore, that she, too, had to leave the revels and accompany the child to her chamber. Sarah's apartments were on the same floor, several doors further on. Having said "Good-night" to the others, she and Philip walked slowly along the piazza, light as day in the moonbeams, until they reached the outer room, the parlor.