I was ashamed to tell him that I had never danced except with a schoolgirl, so I took his hand and started. But hardly had we begun, when I made mistakes, which I thought everybody saw (I am sure Alma saw them), and before we had taken many turns my partner had to stop, whereupon I retired to my seat with a forced laugh and a sense of confusion.
It was nearly twelve when they began the Cotillon, which Alma and my husband led with supreme self-possession. As one of the hostesses I sat in the front row of the square, and when I was taken out I made further mistakes, which also Alma saw and communicated by smiles to my husband.
Before the Cotillon came to an end the night was far spent and then the company, which had become very boisterous, began to look for some new excitement, no matter how foolish. One or other started "turkey trot" and "grizzly bear" and finally Alma, with memories of the winter sports at St. Moritz, proposed that they should toboggan down the great staircase.
The suggestion was welcomed with a shout, and a broad board was immediately laid on the first long flight of stairs for people to slide on.
Soldiers went first, and then there were calls for the ladies, when Alma took her turn, tucking her dress under her at the top and alighting safely on her feet at the bottom. Other ladies followed her example, with similar good fortune, and then Alma, who had been saying "Such fun! Such lots of fun!" set up a cry of "Margaret Mary."
I refused at first, feeling ashamed of even looking at such unwomanly folly, but something Alma said to my husband and something that was conveyed by my husband's glance at me set my heart afire and, poor feverish and entangled fool that I was, I determined to defy them.
So running up to the top and seating myself on the toboggan I set it in motion. But hardly had I done so when it swayed, reeled, twisted and threw me off, with the result that I rolled downstairs to the bottom.
Of course there were shrieks of laughter, and if I had been in the spirit of the time and place I suppose I should have laughed too, and there would have been an end of the matter. But I had been playing a part, a tragic part, and feeling that I had failed and covered myself with ridicule, I was overwhelmed with confusion.
I thought my husband would be angry with me, and feel compromised by my foolishness, but he was not; he was amused, and when at last I saw his face it was running in rivulets from the laughter he could not restrain.
That was the end of all things, and when Alma came up to me, saying everything that was affectionate and insincere, about her "poor dear unfortunate Margaret Mary" (only women know how to wound each other so), I brushed her aside, went off to my bedroom, and lay face down on the sofa, feeling that I was utterly beaten and could fight no more.