As they sat down he bent over to her.

"You are glad I made Carlotta put us together," he said, and this, too, was no question, but an a.s.sertion.

Tony was in arms in a flash.

"On the contrary, I am exceedingly sorry she gave in to you. You seem to be altogether too accustomed to having your own way as it is." And rather pointedly she turned her pretty shoulder on her too presuming neighbor and proceeded to devote her undivided attention for two entire courses to Hal Underwood.

But, with the fish, Hal's partner on the other side, a slim young person in a glittering green sequined gown, suggesting a fish herself, or, at politest, a mermaid, challenged his notice and Tony returned perforce to her left-hand companion who had not spoken a single word since she had snubbed him as Tony was well aware, though she had seemed so entirely absorbed in her own conversation with Hal.

His gray-green eyes smiled imperturbably into hers.

"Am I pardoned? Surely I have been punished enough for my sins, whatever they may have been."

"I hope so," said Tony. "Are you always so disagreeable?"

"I am never disagreeable when I am having my own way. I am always good when I am happy. At this moment I am very, very good."

"It hardly seems possible," said Tony. "Carlotta said you were not good at all."

He shrugged, a favorite mannerism, it seemed.

"Goodness is relative and a very dull topic in any case. Let us talk, instead, of the most interesting subject in the universe--love. You know, of course, I am madly in love with you."

"Indeed, no. I didn't suspect it," parried Tony. "You fall in love easily."

"Scarcely easily, in this case. I should say rather upon tremendous provocation. I suppose you know how beautiful you are."

"I look in the mirror occasionally," admitted Tony with a glimmer of mischief in her eyes. "Carlotta told me you were a philanderer.

Forewarned is forearmed, Mr. Ma.s.sey."

"Ah, but this isn't philandery. It is truth." Suddenly the mockery had died out of his voice and his eyes. "_Carissima,_ I have waited a very long time for you--too long. Life has been an arid waste without you, but, Allah be praised, you are here at last. You are going to love me--ah, my Tony--how you are going to love me!" The last words were spoken very low for the girl's ears alone, though more than one person at the table seeing him bend over her, understood, that Alan Ma.s.sey, that professional master-lover was "off" again.

"Don't, Mr. Ma.s.sey. I don't care for that kind of jest."

"Jest! Good G.o.d! Tony Holiday, don't you know that I mean it, that this, is the real thing at last for me--and for you? Don't fight it, Mademoiselle Beautiful. It will do no good. I love you and you are going to love me--divinely."

"I don't even like you," denied Tony hotly.

"What of that? What do I care for your liking? That is for others. But your loving--that shall be mine--all mine. You will see."

"I am afraid you are very much mistaken if you do mean all you are saying. Please talk to Miss Irvine now. You haven't said a word to her since you sat down. I hate rudeness."

Again Tony turned a cold shoulder upon her amazing dinner companion but she did not do it so easily or so calmly this time. She was not unused to the strange ways of men. Not for nothing had she spent so much of her life at army posts where love-making is as familiar as bra.s.s b.u.t.tons.

Sudden gusts of pa.s.sion were no novelty to her, nor was it a new thing to hear that a man thought he loved her. But Alan Ma.s.sey was different.

She disliked him intensely, she resented the arrogance of his a.s.sumptions with all her might, but he interested her amazingly. And, incredible as it might seem and not to be admitted out loud, he was speaking the truth, just now. He did love her. In her heart Tony knew that she had felt his love before he had ever spoken a word to her when their eyes had met as he stood on the threshold and she knew too instinctively, that his love--if it was that--was not a thing to be treated like the little summer day loves of the others. It was big, rather fearful, not to be flouted or played with. One did not play with a meteor when it crossed one's path. One fled from it or stayed and let it destroy one if it would.

She roused herself to think of other people, to forget Alan Ma.s.sey and his wonderful voice which had said such perturbing things. Over across the table, Carlotta was talking vivaciously to a pasty-visaged, narrow-chested, stoop-shouldered youth who scarcely opened his mouth except to consume food, but whose eyes drank in every movement of Carlotta's. One saw at a glance he was another of that spoiled little coquette's many victims. Tony asked Hal who he was. He seemed scarcely worth so many of Carlotta's sparkles, she thought.

"Herb Lathrop--father is the big tea and coffee man--all rolled up in millions. Carlotta's people are putting all the bets on him, apparently, though for the life of me I can't see why. Don't see why people with money are always expected to match up with somebody with a whole caboodle of the same junk. Ought to be evened up I think, and a bit of eugenics slipped in, instead of so much cash, for good measure. You can see what a poor fish he is. In my opinion she had much better marry your neighbor up there on the Hill. He is worth a gross of Herb Lathrops and she knows it. Carlotta is no fool."

"You mean Phil Lambert?" Tony was surprised.

Hal nodded.

"That's the chap. Only man I ever knew that could keep Carlotta in order."

"But Carlotta hasn't the slightest idea of marrying Phil," objected Tony.

"Maybe not. I only say he is the man she ought to marry. I say, Tony, does she seem happy to you?"

"Carlotta! Why, yes. I hadn't thought. She seems gayer than usual, if anything." Tony's eyes sought her friend's face. Was there something a little forced about that gaiety of hers? For the first time it struck her that there was a restlessness in the lovely violet eyes which was unfamiliar. Was Carlotta unhappy? Evidently Hal thought so. "You have sharp eyes, Hal," she commented. "I hadn't noticed."

"Oh, I'm one of the singed moths you know. I know Carlotta pretty well and I know she is fighting some kind of a fight--maybe with herself. I rather think it is. Tell Phil Lambert to come down here and marry her out of hand. I tell you Lambert's the man."

"You think Carlotta loves Phil?"

"I don't think. 'Tisn't my business prying into a girl's fancies. I'm simply telling you Phil Lambert is the man that ought to marry her, and if he doesn't get on to the job almighty quick that pop-eyed simpleton over there will be prancing down the aisle to Lohengrin with Carlotta before Christmas, and the jig will be up. You tell him what I say. And study the thing a bit yourself while you are here, Tony. See if you can get to the bottom of it. I hate to have her mess things up for herself that way."

Whereupon Hal once more proceeded to do his duty to the mermaid, leaving Tony to her other partner.

"Well," the latter murmured, seeing her free. "I have done the heavy polite act, discussed D'Annunzio, polo and psycho-a.n.a.lysis and finished all three subjects neatly. Do I get my reward?"

"What do you ask?"

"The first dance and then the garden and the moon and you--all to myself."

Tony shook her head. She was on guard.

"I shall want more than one dance and more than one partner. I am afraid I shan't have time for the moon and the garden to-night. I adore dancing.

I never stop until the music does."

A flash of exultancy leaped into his eyes.

"So? I might have known you would adore dancing. You shall have your fill. You shall have many dances, but only one partner. I shall suffice.

I am one of the best dancers in the world."

"And evidently one of the vainest men," coolly.

"What of it? Vanity is good when it is not misplaced. But I was not boasting. I _am_ one of the best dancers in the world. Why should I not be? My mother was Lucia Vannini. She danced before princes." He might have added, "She was a prince's mistress." It had been the truth.

"Oh!" cried Tony. She had heard of Lucia Vannini--a famous Italian beauty and dancer of three decades ago. So Alan Ma.s.sey was her son. No wonder he was foreign, different, in ways and looks. One could forgive his extravagances when one knew.

"Ah, you like that, my beauty? You will like it even better when you have danced with me. It is then that you will know what it is to dance.

We shall dance and dance and--love. I shall make you mine dancing, _Toinetta mia_."

Tony shrank back from his ardent eyes and his veiled threat. She was a pa.s.sionate devotee of her own freedom. She did not want to be made his or any man's--certainly not his. She decided not to dance with him at all.

But later, when the violins began to play and Alan Ma.s.sey came and stood before her, uttering no word but commanding her to him with his eyes and his out-stretched, nervous, slender, strong, artist hands, she yielded--could scarcely have refused if she had wanted to. But she did not want to, though she told herself it was with Lucia Vannini's son rather than with Alan Ma.s.sey that she desired to dance.