He stands rooted to the spot as she passes him by, her dress brushing his knees. Her lovely face softens for a moment; she smiles half sadly, half contemptuously, as she whispers—
"Not a word, Jack? Well, perhaps you are right. Do not wear the willow, though; I am not worth it."
"Who is she—eh, Everard? Can't you speak?"
"Oh, she is a—a Lady Saunderson! I say, Archer, introduce me to that girl in pink over there, will you? Jolly-looking girl!"
His fatigue forgotten, unfelt, Everard is soon whirling quickly round the room, whispering nonsense into his partner's ear, but feeling everywhere, though he looks not directly at her again, the cold beautiful face of the woman he loves, watching him, reading the tempest of his mind.
"Very good—very good indeed, Jack; but take care not to overdo it. Take your pleasure a little more languidly; it will be much more effective," says Miss Wynyard, laying her hand encouragingly on her cousin's shoulder.
"Have you spoken to her, Florry?" he asks eagerly.
"No, I have only bowed and half smiled; but in a month or two," says Miss Wynyard frankly, "I guess our hands will meet in amity. You won't mind, will you, Jack? But you know the principle of my life has always been to make friends with the mammon of iniquity; and it is a principle that I have found to pay in the long run. How well she is looking, and how grandly she carries it off, doesn't she? I always knew there was a spice of the fiend in Pauline Lefroy. Do you know, Jack, I rather pity Sir Arthur, ill-conditioned animal that he is. He must have loved her to—"
"Loved her! Pshaw! He never meant to marry her from the beginning; he actually said so one day at the club to a fellow I know; and it was only when he found I was in possession that he appeared on the scene and took to dogging her again."
"Well, never mind, Jack; you have come out of the business capitally, with a dignity and a reserve that quite astonished me."