"Here we are at last, Addie; wake up—wake up! How lovely the house looks blazing with light! Listen to the music; they must have begun dancing. Oh, Tom, get out quick!"
However, when they appear on the gay and crowded scene, Miss Pauline's effervescence somewhat subsides. A feeling of diffidence, of timidity almost, seizes her. She half shrinks behind her brother-in-law's broad shoulders when one of their hostess's sons appears, a smiling partner in tow. However, it is Mrs. Armstrong who is borne off first; and then Pauline steps a little forward and sends her roving eye round the room with success. A little later Addie returns breathless, with eyes sparkling with excitement and pleasure.
"I've had such a lovely dance, Tom; I never thought I should like it so much or keep in step as I did! Where's Polly? How is she getting on?"
Armstrong points across the room, where Miss Lefroy, with her deer-like head erect, stands surrounded by a group of young men eagerly seeking to inscribe her name on their cards.
"She's getting on fairly for a beginner, isn't she? I don't fancy she'll trouble us much more with her society to-night."
He is right. Miss Pauline, whether ignorant of or regardless of the etiquette of ball-room proprieties, returns no more to the corner she left in maiden trepidation at the request of a dapper little squire, fair-haired and blue-eyed, whose heart she stormed the first moment she entered the room.
"Tom," says Addie, two hours later, when she returns again, a little exhausted with the unusual exercise, to the spot where he stands so patiently propped up against the wall watching the élite of Nutshire taking their pleasure, "look at Pauline; she is dancing again with that blue-eyed boy—the fourth time, I think. I tried to attract her attention two or three times; but she either did not or would not see me. I don't know much about the proprieties; but don't you think—"
"I know even less about them than you, my dear. I think I have not been to half a dozen balls in my life, and never before as the guardian of a young lady's morals; so I won't presume to advise you. It seems to me she is enjoying herself in a very innocent and above-board manner. I wouldn't try to stop her."
"Do you know her partner, Tom?"