He inclined his ear toward her, and she said in a laughing whisper: "Clive, I feel beautiful to-night. Do you know how it feels to feel beautiful?"
"Not personally," he admitted; and they separated still laughing like two children, the focus of sympathetic, amused, or envious glances from the brilliantly dressed throng clustering at the two cloak rooms.
She came to him presently where he was waiting, and, instinctively the groups around the doors made a lane for the fair young girl who came forward with the ghost of a smile on her lips as though entirely unconscious of herself and of everybody except the man who moved out to meet her.
"It's true," he murmured; "you are the most beautiful thing in this beauty-ridden town."
"You'll spoil me, Clive."
"Is that possible?"
"I don't know. Don't try. There is a great deal in me that has never been disturbed, never been brought out. Maybe much of it is evil," she added lightly.
He turned; she met his eyes half seriously, half mockingly, and they laughed. But what she had said so lightly in jest remained for a few moments in his mind to occupy and slightly trouble it.
From their table beside the bronze-railed gallery, they could overlook the main floor where a wide lane for dancing had been cleared and