Hanny was quite sure her face grew redder. And this ideal girl was beautiful. Oh, dear!

"Yes, tall; a daughter of the gods, or the old Norse Vikings before they were Anglicised, with fair hair. And you have the fair hair."

"But I am not tall! I am sorry to have you disappointed."

"I am not disappointed. What does a vagrant fancy amount to? I consider myself fortunate in meeting Miss Underhill. Why, suppose I had gone rambling about and missed you altogether? Have you known the Jaspers long?"

"Oh, years and years. Before they went abroad."

"What a beautiful girl Daisy is! I am glad she is here enjoying herself.

Oh, isn't it the regulation thing to speak of the hero of the feast? Of course when you heard he was coming to lecture you began to read his novels--if you had not before."

"I had not read them before. There are a great many books I have not read. But I tried at 'Vanity Fair;' and I am afraid I don't like it."

"I do not believe you will now. I can't imagine real young people liking them. But when one has grown older and had sorrow and suffering and experience, there are so many touches that go to one's heart. And 'Vanity Fair' is a novel without a hero. Still I always feel sorry for poor Major Dobbins. I wonder if Amelia would have liked him better if his name had been something else? Could you fall in love with such a name?"

They both laughed. She raised her eyes. How exquisitely fair and sweet and dainty she was! The soft hair had shining lights; and her eyes had a twilight look that suggested a pellucid lake, with evening shades blowing over it.

"A little more of something would have made him a hero, and spoiled the book."

"But I don't like Amelia, nor Becky; and the Crawleys are horrid. And Thackeray seems holding up everybody and laughing at them. I like to believe in people."

"I am glad there is a time when we can believe in them: it is the radiant time of youth. What did that little smile hide, and half betray?

Confess!"

"Are you so very old?"

The charming gravity was irresistible.

"Seven and twenty, and I am beginning to worship Thackeray. At seven and thirty, he will be one of my passions, I know. Now and then I come to a sentence that goes to my heart. No, do not read him yet awhile, unless it is some of the little things. There is 'Dr. Birch and his Young Friends;' and if you want to be amused you must read his continuation of 'Ivanhoe.' But then you will have neither heroines nor heroes left. And if you and Miss Daisy want to laugh beyond measure, get the 'Rose and the Ring,' that he wrote for his two little girls."

"Oh," said Hanny, "are they at home, in England?"

"Yes, with an aunt."

"Haven't they any mother?"

"They have no mother," he said gravely.

Years later, the novelist was to be one of the little girl's heroes, when she knew all the bravery of his life, and why his little girls were without a mother.

Joe and Daisy returned, and there was a pleasant rencontre; then Delia and Ben came up, and they had a merry chat and a promenade.

"I wonder," as the musicians began tuning again, "if you are engaged for all the dances. Could I be allowed one?"

He took up her card.

"I have been dancing so much already; but Mrs. Jasper said I might try the Spanish dance."

"Oh, then try it with me! I am not too old to dance, if I have come to adoring Thackeray. And I am to go away soon."

"To go away--where?" And she glanced up with an interest that gave him a quick sense of pleasure.

"To Hamburg first; then to find some relations."

"In Germany? But you are not a German?" in surprise.

"I ought to be a Dane, if one's birth counts for anything; and if one's ancestors count, then an old Dutch Knickerbocker," he returned, with a soft, amused laugh. "But I believe I cannot boast of any English descent, such as the son of a hundred earls. That doesn't sound as poetic as the daughter of a hundred earls."

"Who was not one to be desired," interposed the young girl.

"Ah, you read Tennyson then? It is odd, but a good many of us begin on poetry. I like it very much myself."

A touch of thought settled between Hanny's brows.

"Are you wondering about my mixed lineage? Part of it came from the old Dutch governor, Jacob Leisler. My grandfather went to Germany, and ran away with a lady of high degree, and brought her back to America, where my father was born, and lived all his young life, until his marriage.

Then business took him abroad, and I was born; and my mother died at Copenhagen. My father is connected with the importing house of Strang, Zahner, & Co., of which Mr. Jasper is a member. He is married again, to a very sweet, amiable German woman. Oh, here we are to take our places!"

Hanny hesitated an instant. She longed to have Mrs. Jasper's approbation.

"We have been looking for you," said Ben. "Let us begin in the one set.

Here is Daisy and Joe."

Then it would be all right. She glanced up and smiled with cordial assent.

The old-fashioned Spanish dance was a great favourite at that time, when germans were unknown. Its graceful turns and windings, its stately balances, until the dancers seemed all one long elegant chain, that moved to the perfect time of the music, was indeed fascinating. People danced then. Youth never dreamed of being bored, and walking languidly.

Every movement was delicate and refined.

Was she really in some enchanted country? When Mr. Andersen was compelled to leave her, he glanced over or past his partner with an expression so near a smile that Hanny's pulses quickened. When he came back, the light touch of his hand gave her a little thrill that was quite delicious. Now and then they had a bit of conversation.

Once he said, in his charming fashion, that was admiration rather than criticism:--

"Why, you _are_ very petite!"

"Yes; I am not the tall, slim English girl."

"I am very glad. We dance so well together; I wish I were not going away so soon. And you can't guess--you will think it strange,--to American ideas it is; but when I go back I have to hunt up a descendant of this grandmother of high degree who has been making matrimonial overtures to my father on my behalf."

"Oh, that is like a story! And what will you do?"

"I will think about it, and answer you when you return to me."

He gave her to the next partner, with a graceful inclination of the head.

There were numberless evolutions before he could take her again. She glanced up out of sweet, questioning eyes.

"I've been considering," he resumed, as if they had not parted. "You see, it is this way. My father is very, very fond of me, though there are other children. Then I have my mother's fortune, which he has been very watchful of. He is a splendid, upright, honourable man. Now, if your father asked such a thing of you,--what I mean is, if he asked you to see some one and learn how well you could like her or him--"

She was off again. Oh, what a sweet little fairy she was! What poet wrote about twinkling feet? Hers certainly twinkled in their daintiness.