When the party was a.s.sembled and past the grenadiers who jealously guard the sacred inner bulwarks, Crabb was glad to relinquish his companion to another, while he sought seclusion behind a bank of azaleas to watch the moving dancers. So she really _was_ somebody. He began, for a moment, to doubt the testimony of the vagrant glances and the guilty parasol. Could he have been mistaken? Had she really forgotten the parasol after all?

The situation was brutal enough for her and he was quite prepared to respect her delicacy. What he did resent was the way in which she had done it. She had taken to cover angrily and stood at bay with all her woman's weapons sharpened. The curl of lip and narrowed eye bespoke a degree of disdain quite out of proportion to the offense. But he made a rapid resolution not to seek her or meet her eye. If his was the fault, it was the only reparation he could offer her.

As he whirled around the room with his little bud, he caught a glimpse of her upon the opposite side and so maneuvered that he would come no nearer. When he had guided his partner to a seat, it did not take him long to gratify a very natural curiosity.

"Will you tell me," he asked, "who--no, don't look now--the girl in the black spangly dress is?"

"Who? Where?" asked Miss Cheston. "Patricia, you mean? Of course! Miss Wharton, my cousin. Haven't you met her?"

"Er--no! She's good-looking."

"Isn't she? And the dearest creature--but rather cold and the least bit prim."

"Pri--Oh, really!"

"Yes! We're Quakers, you know. She belongs to the older set. Perhaps that's why she seems a trifle cold and--er--conventional."

"Convent--! Oh, yes, of course."

"You know we're really quite a breezy lot, if you only know us. Some of this year's debs are really very dreadful."

"How shocking, and Miss Wharton is not dreadful?"

"Oh, dear, no. But she is awfully good fun. Come, you must meet her. Let me take you over."

But good fortune in the person of Stephen Ventnor intervened.

It was the unexpected which was to happen. Crabb was returning from the table with a favor. His eye ran along the line of chairs in a brief fruitless search. Mr. Barclay, who was leading the cotillion, caught his eye at this precise psychological moment.

"Stranded, Crabb? Let me present you to----"

He mentioned no name but was off in a moment winding in and out among those on the floor. Crabb followed. When he had succeeded in eluding the imminent dancers and had reached the other side of the room, there was Barclay bending over.

"Awfully nice chap--stranger," he was saying, and then aloud, "Miss Wharton, may I present--Mr. Crabb?"

It was all over in a moment. The crowded room had hidden the black dress and the fair hair. But it was too late. Barclay was off in a second and there they were looking again into each other's eyes, Patricia pale and cold as stone, Crabb a trifle ill at ease at the awkward situation which, however appearances were against him, was none of his choosing.

Crabb inclined his head and extended the hand which carried his favor.

They both glanced down, seeking in that innocent trinket a momentary refuge from the predicament. It was then for the first time that Crabb discovered the thing he was offering her--a little frivolous green silk parasol.

She looked up at him again, her eyes blazing, but she rose to her feet and looked around her as though seeking some mode of escape. He fully expected that she would refuse to dance, and was preparing to withdraw as gracefully as he might when, with chin erect and eyes which looked and carried her spirit quite beyond him, she took the parasol and followed him upon the floor.

But the subtlety of suggestion which seemed to possess Crabb's particular little comedy was to be still more amusingly developed. The figure in which they became a part was a pretty vari-colored whirl of flowers and ribbons, in which the green parasols were destined to play a part. For a miniature Maypole was brought and the parasols were fastened to the depending ribbons in accordance with their color.

As the figure progressed and the dancers interwove, Crabb could not fail to note the recurrent intentional snub. He felt himself blameless in the unlucky situation, and this needless display of hostility so clearly expressed seemed made in very bad taste. Each time he pa.s.sed the flaunted shoulder, the upcast chin, or curling lip, he found his humility to be growing less and less until as the dance neared its end he glowed with a very righteous ire. If she had meant to deny him completely, she should have chosen the opportunity when he had first come up. And as he pa.s.sed her, he rejoiced in the discovery that she had inadvertently chosen the other end of the ribbon attached to the very parasol which he bore. When the May dance was over, Miss Wharton found Mr. Crabb at her side handing her the green parasol precisely as he had handed her that other one in the Square six months before.

"I beg pardon," he was saying quizzically, "but isn't this yours?"

The accent and benevolent eye were unmistakable. If there were any arrow in her quiver of scorn unshot, his effrontery completely disarmed her. If looks could have killed, Crabb must have died at once. a.s.sured of the depths of his infamy, she could only murmur rather faintly:

"I shall go to my seat, at once, please." Indeed, Crabb was a very lively corpse. He was smiling coolly down at her.

"Certainly, if you wish it. Only--er--I hope you'll let me go along."

How she hated him! The words uttered again with the same smiling effrontery seemed to be burned anew into her memory. Could she never be free from this inevitable man? Her seat was at the far end of the room.

"I think you have done me some injustice," he said quietly, and then, "It has been a pleasant dance. Thank you so much."

"Thank you," replied Patricia acidly, and he was gone.

CHAPTER VIII

Miss Wharton rather crossly dismissed her weary maid, and threw herself into an armchair. Odious situation! Her peccadillo had found her out!

What made the matter still worse was the ingenuous impeccability of her villain. On every hand she heard his praises sung. And it vexed her that she had been unable to contribute anything to his detriment. Of course, after seeing her leave the parasol it would have been stupid of him to--to let her forget it. In her thoughts that adventure had long since been condoned. It was this new _rencontre_ which had so upset her. It angered her to think how little delicacy he gave her credit for when he had asked Jack Barclay to present him. If they had met by chance, it would have been different. She would have been sharply civil, but not retrospective; and would have trusted to his sense of the situation to be the same. That he had a.s.sailed her helpless barriers, wrote him down a brute, divested him of all the garments of sensibility in which she had clothed him. It angered her to think that her fancy had seen fit to make him any other than he was. But mingled with her anger, she was surprised to discover disappointment, too. It was this--this person who shared with her the secret of her one iniquity.

She pulled impatiently at her long gloves and arose with an air of finality. And so Miss Wharton put the importunate Mr. Crabb entirely from her mind; until the following Thursday night at the dinner at the Hollingsworths'.

"Patty, dear, have you met Mr. Crabb?" Mrs. Hollingsworth was saying.

Miss Wharton had, at the a.s.sembly.

Mr. Crabb politely echoed; and Patricia hated him for the nebulous smile which seemed to contain hidden meanings. But she rose to the occasion in a way which seemed to disconcert her companion--who only answered her rapid fire of commonplaces in monosyllables. At the table she found her refuge upon the other side to be an Italian from the emba.s.sy at Washington, whose French limped but whose English was a cripple. And so they minced and stuttered, Ollendorf fashion, through the oysters and soup, while Crabb occupied himself with the daughter of the house upon his other side. But at last Patty was aware that Mr. Crabb was speaking.

"Miss Wharton," he began, "I fear I've been put somewhat under a cloud."

"Really," she answered sweetly, "how so?"

A little disconcerted but undismayed, he continued:

"Because of the manner of our meeting."

"Our meeting!" she said uncertainly.

"At the a.s.sembly, you know. I thought perhaps that--you thought--I'd asked to be presented."

"Didn't you? Then, how did we happen to meet?"

He could not but admire her _sang-froid_. She was smiling a non-committal smile at the centerpiece.

"Er--I should explain. I was adrift and Barclay came to my rescue. I give you my word, I had no notion it was to you he was taking me. It was all over in a second."

"Then you really didn't wish to meet me? I'm so sorry."

She had turned her face slowly to his and was looking him levelly in the eyes. It was a challenge, not a pet.i.tion. He met her thrust fairly.

"My dear Miss Wharton," he smiled, "how could I know what you were like--er--if I'd never seen you?"