"No, never. I have always avoided it!"
"And how many seasons have you been through?"
"Not one."
"There, you see! Now, Leon, look at me!" Daintily placing a finger beneath his chin, she turned his face up to hers. "Is it fair to say you dislike a thing you have never tried? How can you tell beforehand? Is it not, perhaps, a little wee bit selfish of you?"
"Yes, it is," promptly replied he. "I am a brute, my darling."
"No, but you had not thought. I think, perhaps, if I—if I had a wife; and if I were foolish enough to be very proud of her, as you are of poor little me, that I should be pleased for people to see her, and to see how happy I made her—and to let all the world know that I loved her so—and—and—oh, Leon, you are laughing at me," and, with a burst of childish merriment, she hid her face in his neck.
"Elsa," cried her lover, as soon as he could speak coherently, "my life, do as you like, go where you will—if you please yourself you please me! I live to make your happiness, mind that!"
This was merely a specimen of the way in which Elsa carried her points. Percivale was a mere child in her hands; she had a knack of making others feel themselves in the wrong, which was little short of genius.
Her presentation was a triumph. London was unanimous in pronouncing her undeniably the beauty of the year; and her engagement to the mysterious Percivale, as well as the romantic story of their first meeting, surrounded them both with a perfect blaze of interest. Nothing else was talked of. The marriage would be the event of the season. The world was more than ever anxious to know more of the owner of the Swan.
"Miss Brabourne has never asked you anything about your belongings, has she?" asked Claud one day of Percivale.