neither age nor sex on the For Lance's sake Mrs Gaynight of the Hunt Ball. Her mer was accepted without husband, Hughie, and the demur. Whatever she was or Reverend Montague D'Arcy- had been-whether she had all suffering from that peculiar manipulated a beer-engine or feeling of languid depression gesticulated in musical comedy which invariably attacks the there she was, and had to be male sex about 9.30 P.M. when assimilated. No questions were dancing is in prospect-were asked, but she was religiously hounded into pumps and white invited to Manors at intervals, gloves and packed into the and Joan and Mrs Leroy, when omnibus, which after a drive they went up to town in the of seven miles, during which season, paid occasional state the gentlemen slept furtively calls upon Mrs Lance at her resiand the tongues of Joan and dence in Maida Vale, where they her girl friends wagged un- drank tea in company with the ceasingly, deposited the entire alumna of the variety stage and party of twelve on the steps of the jug-and-bottle department. the Town Hall at Midfield. Their numbers had been completed by some overnight arrivals. The first two were Mr and Mrs Lance Gaymer. Joan's only brother had taken upon him the responsibility of matrimony at the early age of twentytwo, and the rather appalling young person who preceded him into the drawing-room, and greeted Joan as "Jowey," was the accessory to the fact. Why or where Lance had married her no one knew. He had sprung her one day, half proudly, half defiantly, upon a family circle at Manors, which was for the moment too horrorstruck to do anything but gape. Fortunately Uncle Jimmy was not present he had departed on his voyage by this timeand it was left to Joan to welcome the latest addition to the house of Gaymer. This she did very sensibly and prettily, though she wept unrestrainedly upon the sympathetic bosom of Mildred Leroy afterwards. Lance himself was understood to be making a living out of journalism. He looked considerably more than twenty-three. The third arrival was a Mr Guy Haliburton, proposed for admission by Mr Lance Gaymer, seconded by Mrs Lance Gaymer. He was full of deference, and apologised with graceful humility for his presence. He felt himself a horrible intruder, he said, but he had been assured so earnestly by "old Lance" that Mrs Leroy was in want of another dancing man, that he had ventured to accept his vicarious invitation and come to Manors. He was made welcome. Mr Haliburton, on further acquaintance, described himself as an actor, but Hughie, whose judgments of men-as opposed to women-were seldom wrong, put him down unhesitatingly as a gentleman who lived, actor or no, by his wits. He was a striking-looking personage of about thirty. He had curly black hair and dark eyes, with dangerous eyelashes. He was well dressed-too well dressed for the country-and one felt instinctively that he was a good card-player, and probably knew something about billiards. The Manors party were greeted in the vestibule of the Town Hall by Lady Fludyer, selfappointed Mistress of the Revels. At present she more nearly resembled a well-nourished Niobe. 66 My dear," she cried, falling limply upon Mrs Leroy and kissing her feverishly, "what do you think has happened?" "Band not come?" hazarded Mrs Leroy. "Worse! Not a man-not a subaltern-not a drummerboy can get away from Ipsleigh to-night!" (Ipsleigh was a neighbouring military depôt, and a fountain-head of eligibility in a barren land.) "They have all been called out to some absurd inspection, or routemarch, or manoeuvres, or something, at twenty-four hours' notice. And they were coming here in swarms! There won't be nearly enough men to go round now. Half the girls will be against the wall all night! Oh, my dear, when I get hold of the General—______” Lady Fludyer's voice rose to a shriek, and she plunged wailing into a dark doorway, like a train entering a tunnel. Mrs Leroy turned to her shrinking cavaliers, with satisfaction in her eye. "It's as well I brought the lot of you," she said. "Now, get to work. Jack, the first waltz with you, if you please." you please." The ball was soon in full swing, though it was only too plain that men were somewhat scarce. Hughie, much to his alarm, found his programme full in ten minutes, and presently, bitterly regretting the stokehold of the Orinoco, put forth into the fray with Mrs Lance Gaymer, having decided to do his duty by that lady as soon as possible, and get it over. She addressed him as "dear boy," and waltzed in a manner which reminded him of the Covent Garden balls of his youth, thereby causing the highest and haughtiest of the county to inquire of their partners who she might be. The word soon passed round that she was the wife of young Gaymer. ("You remember, don't you? Rather an unfortunate marriage, and all that. Barmaid, or something. family have decided to make the best of her. They'll have their hands full-eh?") Whereupon fair women elevated their discreetly powdered noses a little higher, while unregenerate men hurried up, like the Four Young Oysters, all eager for the treat, and furtively petitioned Lance Gaymer to introduce them to his wife. However, the On entering the ballroom Joan Gaymer, serenely conscious of a perfectly-fitting new frock and her very best tinge of colour, took up her stand at her recognised "pitch' beside the end pillar on the left under the musicians' gallery, and proceeded to fill up the vacancies caused in her programme by the defection of the dancing warriors from Ipsleigh. Among the first applicants for the favour of a waltz was Mr Get introduced to her-she's Guy Haliburton. "All right-Number Two," said Joan. Haliburton wrote it down, and asked for another. "I'll see how you waltz first," said Miss Gaymer frankly. "Then-perhaps! I am rather particular." The music had risen to her brain like wine, and she was in what her admirers would have called her most regal, and her detractors her most objectionable, mood. Mr Haliburton, however, merely bowed reverentially, and made way for an avalanche of Binkses and Cherubs, with whom Joan, babbling at the top of her voice and enjoying every moment of her triumph, booked a list of fixtures that stretched away far into to-morrow morning. The waltz with the fascinating Haliburton proved so satisfactory-in point of fact, he was easily the best dancer in the room-that Joan immediately granted him two more. It was characteristic of her that she declined to take the floor again until the unfortunate gentlemen at whose expense Haliburton was being honoured had been found, brought to her, and apprised of their fate. They protested feebly, but Joan swept them aside in a fashion with which they were only too familiar. "Run way, chicks," she said maternally, "and get fresh partners. There are heaps of nice girls to spare to-night. Look at that little thing over there, with the blue eyes, and forget-me-nots in her hair. perfectly lovely. Worth six of me, any day. Trot!" But the two young men, refusing to be comforted, growled sulkily and elbowed their way outside, to console each other for the fragility of petticoat promises, and fortify themselves against any further slings and arrows of outrageous Fortune of a similar nature, in the refreshment room. Still, the girl to whom Joan had directed their attention was well worth notice. She stood near the door, a slim, graceful, and somehow rather appealing little figure. Her hair was the colour of ripe corn, her eyes, wide and wondering, were as blue as the forget-me-nots in her hair, and her lips, to quote King Solomon upon a very different type of female, were like a thread of scarlet. She wore a simple white frock, and carried in her hand the bouquet of the débutante. Joan swung past her in the embrace of the ever faithful Binks. "That child is a perfect dream," she said to herself, "but her mouth is trembling at the corners. I wonder if some man has forgotten to ask her to dance. I should think At this point in her reflections she was whirled heavily into the orbit of a reversing couple, and the ensuing collision, together with the enjoyment of exacting a grovelling apology from the hapless Binks (who was in no way responsible for the accident), drove further cogitations on the subject of the girl with the forget-me-nots out of her head. ner About midnight Joan slipped upstairs to what her last part8 mechanically-minded young gentleman from Woolwich-described as the repairing shop, to make good the ravages effected by the lancers as danced in high society in the present year of grace. The music for the next waltz was just beginning when she returned to her pillar. No eager partner awaited her, which was unusual; and Joan glanced at her programme. She bit her lip. "Number Eight," she said to herself. 66 Joey, my child, he has scored you off—and you deserve it!" This cryptic utterance had reference to Mr Hugh Marrable, to whom it may be remembered this particular dance had been offered, much as bone is thrown to a dog, on the lawn at Manors three days before. 8 Hughie's subsequent demeanour had piqued his ward's curiosity. He had made no further reference to Number Eight, neither had he made any attempt during this evening to come up and confirm the fixture. In fact, he had not asked Joan for a dance at all, with the consequence that Miss Gaymer, who, serenely confident that her guardian would come and eat humble pie at the last moment, had kept Number Eight free, now found herself occupying the rather unusual role of wallflower. What was more, she knew she would be unable to pick up a partner, for every available man was being worked to the last ounce, and pretty girls still sat here and there about the room, chatting with chaperones and maintaining a brave appearance of enjoyment and insouciance. "I'm not going to let Hughie see me propping a wall this dance," said Joan to herself with decision. "He would think I had been keeping it for him. What shall I do? Go back to the cloak-room? No; it is always full of girls without partners pretending they've just dropped in to get sewn up. I'll go to the Mayor's parlour and sit there. It's never used at these dances." Making a mental entry on the debit side of her missing partner's ledger, Miss Gaymer retired unostentatiously from the ball-room, and turned down an unlighted passage, which was blocked by a heavy screen marked "private," and encumbered with rolls of carpet and superfluous furniture. The darkened passage was comfortably cool and peaceful after the blaze and turmoil of the field of action, and apparently had not been discovered by couples in search of seclusion. Joan was approaching the end, where she knew the door of the Mayor's parlour was situated, when she became aware of a certain subdued sound quite near her. It was a sound well calculated to catch the ear of one so tender-hearted as herself. Some one was sobbing, very wretchedly, in the darkness within a few feet of her. Joan stopped short, a little The sobbing ceased, and the white figure sat up with a start. "If you don't mind," continued Joan, "I'm going to turn up this electric light." There was a click, and the rays of a single and rather dusty incandescent lamp illuminated the scene, and with it the slender figure, seated forlornly on a roll of red carpet, of the little lady of the forgetme-nots. Her face was flushed with sudden shame, for her shoulders were still heaving, and her cheeks glistened with tears, the which she dabbed confusedly with a totally inadequate scrap of pocket-handkerchief. Joan, regardless of her new frock, was down upon the dusty roll of carpet in a moment. She put her arm round the girl. "My dear," she said authoritatively, "what is it? Tell carded bouquet lying on the grimy floor. Her father had put it into her hand, and hung a little enamel pendant round her neck, and given her a kiss she told her story with all a child's fidelity to detail-and had despatched her in her brother's charge, with admonitions not to break too many hearts, on the long fourteenmile drive to Midfield-a period occupied in ecstatic anticipations of the event to which she had been looking forward ever since she had put her hair up. Her brother, on their arrival, had booked one dance with her -subsequently cancelled with many apologies on the ground that he had just met a girl whom he simply must dance with- and introduced her to two young men whose programmes were already full; after which he had plunged into the crowd, comfortably conscious that his duty had been done, leaving his sister to stand, smiling bravely, with tingling feet and her heart in her throat, from half-past nine until a quarter - past twelve. The music was pulsing in her ears, youth and laughter were swinging easily past her-even brushing her skirts; and she was utterly and absolutely alone. She was just eighteen; she was the prettiest girl-with the possible exception of Joan Gaymer-in the room; it was her first ball-and not a man had asked her to dance. A small matter, perhaps, compared with some, but men have blown out their brains for less. Long before she had sobbed out all her pitiful little narra |