"Wait a moment: I will ask her permission."
As Mr. Allen went to prefer his request the doctor narrowly watched the result. A slight accession of color on the lady's face as her old friend indicated him told Maurice he had been recognized; which fact rendered her answer more annoying, for "Miss Lafitte begged to be excused: she was fatigued and wished to retire."
But she did not retire, as he saw with an irritation that grew as the evening advanced. For what reason did she refuse to make his acquaintance? Did she extend to him the dislike she had for his cousin? Did she class him among the fops, or was it but a caprice?
Now, Dr. Grey was a truthful man, and he told himself the case interested him. When, later, he was accosted by an old college-chum, George Clifton, who proceeded to give him the newest confidential slander at the lake, it was but natural he should try to unravel this mystery.
"What do you fellows mean by not surrounding that beauty over there? Where are your eyes?" he asked.
"Miss Lafitte? We have dubbed her the man-hater. She has never been known to make herself agreeable to any male creature under fifty, and not then if he were either a bachelor or a widower. A fellow is obliged to marry before he can be received. Rather too great a sacrifice, isn't it?"
"French blood?" insinuated the doctor.
"French?—as if wickedness had a country and was too patriotic to travel! You are an olive-gray, Maurice. Besides, you could as truthfully accuse an oyster of light behavior."
On making further inquiries one lady told him that she understood the beauty was a bluestocking, and when he asked another why Fay appeared to shun gentlemen's society, "To make them more eager to seek her," was the reply.
"What an amount of trash one can hear at these places in a single hour!" muttered Dr. Grey as he retired that night: then he added, thoughtfully, "I shall certainly make her acquaintance."