‘Well, Mab, are you getting partners?’ Mrs. Plowden said, whose attention had been riveted upon her own children, and who, in sincerity, had scarcely noticed Mab until she danced with Jim.
‘Partners! she has never once sat down the whole evening,’ cried Miss Grey.
Mrs. Plowden was aware that Emmy had not danced the two last dances, and she felt the humiliation; but she smiled. ‘Everybody is anxious that a girl should enjoy her first ball,’ she said. ‘Jim wanted you so much to enjoy yourself to-night.’
‘Well, she paid him back for it,’ said Miss Grey; ‘she threw over Bobby Wade for him.’
‘Bobby Wade!’ cried Mrs. Plowden.
Bobby Wade had not asked either of the Rectory girls. This little heartburning ran on along all the line of mothers who sat or stood by the wall. Mr. Wade and Mr. Swinford were the two men whose approach made every heart beat. Those who had not been asked by them—or, rather, whose daughters had not been asked by them—felt the vanity of the whole affair, and that the apples which were so bright outside were but ashes within. Leo, for his part, worked very hard that nobody might be left out; but young Wade did not care in the least, dancing up with his arm extended to the young lady he fancied, when he pleased, and carrying her off sometimes under the very nose of her partner.
‘He had better not try that on with me,’ said Jim.
‘What would you do? You couldn’t knock him down in Mrs. FitzStephen’s room?’
‘No, I don’t suppose I could do that,’ said Jim, ‘for their sakes; but I should certainly give him to understand——’
‘How could you give him to understand?’ said Mab, pursuing her cousin with pitiless practicality. But, as it happened, the proof of what Jim could do occurred at once, for Mr. Wade made a long step up to her—her very self—and held out that insolent arm.