“Miss Strangeways, is it possible that you have a dance to spare? I have a truant here who has just made his appearance, and expects me to find partners at this hour of the night. He doesn’t deserve any mercy, but if you could take pity upon him, it would be very noble.”
Vanna looked past the speaker and beheld a tall, spare man, with a sunburnt face, out of which a pair of brown eyes smiled at her with the frankness of a lifelong friend, rather than a complete stranger. It was impossible not to smile back, and it was with a reviving thrill of interest that she held out her programme, saying laughingly:
“My partners for the regular dances are busy eating boned turkey, while I am left lamenting. I am not engaged for the extras.”
“Ah! that is fortunate! Let me introduce you, then, in due form. Mr Gloucester—Miss Strangeways... You are a lucky man, Rob, to find Miss Strangeways disengaged.”
She rustled away, and the tall man seated himself by Vanna’s side with a sigh of content. He did not ask for dances, however, and it was she who made the first move towards conversation.
“Have you really just arrived, or is that merely a figure of speech? You have not been dancing at all?”
He shook his head.
“I have not been in the room five minutes. I am an even worse offender than you suppose, for I am staying in the house. I did not intend to come down at all. I was going to bed, but there was such a confounded noise going on that there seemed no chance of sleep—”
For the first time that evening Vanna found herself surprised into a bright, natural laugh. The man’s utter unconsciousness redeemed his remark from any hint of rudeness; and she felt nothing but pure refreshment in so unusual a point of view. She leant back in her chair, looking at him over the top of a waving fan, with a scrutiny as frankly unembarrassed as his own. The deep tan of his skin spoke of a sojourn under eastern skies, as did also the lines round the eyes—the result of constant puckerings to avoid the sun’s glare. His hair was brushed in a straight line across his forehead, the chin itself was slightly square, but the line of the jaw was finely, even delicately rounded; he was clean shaven, and his mouth was good to look at, the lips well shaped, and fitting closely together. His age might have been anything from thirty to thirty-five, but there was something inherently boyish in manner and expression.
“You evidently don’t care for dancing.”