"So this is your début before society, Miss Ford?" Mr. Alexander observed, and charmed by the maiden's refreshing ingenuousness.
"Yes, as a vocalist; not socially, however, for Mrs. Jerome kindly introduced me, with Miss Jerome, some time ago," Dorothy replied, adding: "I have, perhaps, enjoyed some advantages to give me confidence which débutantes, as a rule, do not have. Mamma having been so much before the public, I have also had my responsibilities in the profession, for"—with a laughing glance at her mother—"I have frequently acted as her chaperon when she has had engagements at a distance from home."
"'Chaperon!' That is rather good, Helen," Mr. Jerome here dryly interposed, and bending a pair of twinkling eyes upon madam. "Well, you do look almost youthful enough to need a chaperon; Alexander was saying only a few moments ago he thought you and Dorothy must be sisters."
"There, mamma, now will you believe what I said to you before we left home?" gleefully exclaimed Dorothy. "I told her," she went on, nodding brightly at Mr. Jerome, "that she is growing younger every year, and no one would suspect that she is the mother of a twenty-five-year-old daughter——"
"'Sh—'sh! Oh, Dorrie, how indiscreet to tell it!" interposed her host, in pretended consternation at her frankness.
"Perhaps it was," retorted the girl, with a roguish gleam in her eyes. "I did not realize what my admission would imply, and I humbly beg mamma's pardon for trespassing upon so delicate a subject," and she curtsied with mock humility to her mother, without a vestige of self-consciousness for having given away her own age.
"Now, I suppose it behooves me to offer thanks to Mr. Alexander for a very pretty compliment," demurely observed Madam Ford, when the laugh at Dorothy's clever repartee had subsided.
"Oh, Helen," groaned Mr. Jerome, who dearly loved to hector, "I am surprised to hear you giving thanks for a compliment at your charming daughter's expense!" Then, turning to Dorothy, he added, with an air of commiseration: "Dorrie, dear, you have my deepest sympathy in view of your aged appearance; if you had only not persisted in growing up, so early, to be so mature, tall, and stately, people would not have been so prone to mistake you for your mother's sister," he concluded, bestowing a reproachful look upon the young man standing beside her.
"Really, Jerome," Clifford Alexander here laughingly interposed, but with heightening color beneath his friend's persistent banter, "I seem inadvertently to have stumbled upon dangerous ground, and there appears to be no way to either advance or retreat with any glory to myself. Pray tell me how I am to propitiate so gallant a champion as you have constituted yourself; also this fair lady"—with a deprecating glance at Dorothy—"whose cause you so ardently espouse."
"This 'fair lady' and her 'champion,' as you are pleased to regard me, have been lovers ever since she was a small girl in short dresses, I would have you understand, and I warn you, young man, that I am very jealous for her—eh, Dorothy?" Mr. Jerome asserted, with a delightful air of proprietorship. "However," he continued, "I can assure you she is easily propitiated, for she is exceedingly amiable."