Not even in the rosy days of her engagement had she longed with such eagerness to spend an evening in his society, and as the night drew near she found herself making the foolish preparations of a débutante for her first ball.
She engaged a dressmaker, who turned her out a purely classic costume; and with a pedestal and the limelight upon her, she might have played Galatea with enthusiastic applause from the house. When fully arrayed on the evening of the dinner, she surveyed herself in the glass, and trembled.
Mrs. Billy greeted her effusively. She herself was prepared for the surgical part of the entertainment with an arrangement of pearl chains which attached her bodice to her person across the upper part of the arms.
“A dream, darling!” she cried, in the caressing, coddling tone she used to all. “I vow I could eat you!” and so saying, she dipped down, kissed Katherine with a light peck on each shoulder, then passed her on, to fall on the neck of the next.
Katherine glanced about the room with a beating heart. At first she saw no one whose presence caused her agitation, and her spirits sank. Then all at once a voice fell upon her ear which sent the blood mantling to her cheeks and brought a faintness to her breast. A man had just entered, and was paying his respects to Mrs. Wesley—a man like unto whom there was not another in the room. Such an air! Such grace! Bayard himself, who, historians agree, was an ideal knight in every particular, was possessed of no more graceful bearing, comeliness of person and affability of manner.
Katherine stood up and shivered. She might have been transformed to Galatea then and there, so statuesque her pose. She was totally unconscious that every eye in the room was wandering with prying curiosity from her to Dick.
Then he saw her.
For a moment he hesitated, but a moment only.
He sped to her with as much empressement as he had shown in the most zealous days of the courtship; his expressive eyes and face were aglow with eagerness.
Katherine remained perfectly still, but two little pulses beating visibly in her temples told whether she was indifferent. “You will speak to me!” he cried, in eager entreaty, under his breath. “If you want me to die in an hour, treat me as a stranger!” He was holding out his hand, and, mechanically, and because she was suddenly aware of the scrutiny of the room, hers went out to it. When Dick clasped it, and she felt the familiar contact of his flesh, she thought she was going to faint.