Waite was in hopeless bewilderment. He particularly liked and admired Robert Gault. He was silent for a few moments, and then exclaimed with seeming irrelevance: "Women do beat me!"
Barbara looked up at him quickly, as she took her seat.
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"I beg your pardon, most fair and inexplicable Mistress Ladd," replied Waite, who had been puzzled almost out of his manners, "but,—if you will permit me to say it,—if this be the fate of your friends, what, oh, what must be the fate of your enemies!"
"I don't understand you!" said Barbara, haughtily. "Pray explain yourself!" But just then a young scarlet-coated officer, Nevil Paget, came up, claiming the hand of Mistress Ladd; and Jerry Waite, who had begun to realise that he was in deep water, hailed the rescue gladly.
"I shall have the honour to claim you again, gracious mistress," said he, "and I shall explain myself then, if you bid me. Meanwhile, I make way for those more fortunate than I."
And now, in her bitterness and disappointment, Barbara flung herself heart and soul into the folly. When the young Englishman started to speak of a duel, she shut him up so mercilessly that for five minutes he durst not open his mouth. But she proceeded to flirt and bedazzle him, half flouting, half flattering, till in five minutes more he was nigh ready to fling all the pedigree of all the Pagets at her small, light-dancing feet and beg her to dance upon it her whole life long. She danced everything, and between the dances held a court more crowded and more devoted than that which had paid her homage at the Van Griffs'. She was deaf to all attempts to lure her out upon the fairy terraces, because when she first saw them she had decided that Robert should take her out there to tell her what a wonderful surprise she had given him. But the men whom she refused were not driven away by her denial. She mixed bitter and sweet for them all so cunningly that none could tell in which of the twain lay the magic that held them thrall. And all the while her heart smouldered in her breast like a hot coal in the ash.
At length came her minuet with Glenowen; and after it her uncle, who thought he detected something feverish in her gaiety, and felt moved to cool it a little if he might without damage, asked her if she had seen Robert.
"For a moment or two," she answered, with an indifference beyond reason.
Glenowen had heard all the story of the duel, and wondered what had gone wrong.