"That's her," said Maxwell, with a wave of his hand towards the group, "playing keek-bo with somebody over Mrs Brydon's shoulder. Just like her saucy ways! You'll find Marion no country cousin, I can tell you, Percival. There's not one of your Edinburgh fine ladies more – Eh? think you have seen her before? I'll be bound you have seen her before! She's been spending the season, I tell you, in Edinburgh, and you that have your entrées everywhere – "
"Not so much as that," said John, with modesty; "and you must remember I have had all the fun cut off this year – "
"Never mind, I am sure you must have met her. Come along, and compare your experiences. I think I'm a man of great magnanimity not to hold you off; but it's better to run the risk of trusting you," he added with a laugh, "than to give you the attraction of the forbidden."
Somehow, however, their progress was slow through the little crowd – quite a little crowd, John felt, to one accustomed to the Assembly Rooms of Edinburgh. But somehow, everybody seemed to get in the way between himself and this lady. Had there not been a whisper sent out through the friendly ranks: "Oh, keep him off me! that man with his story about the stage-coach. I cannot abide these funny men with their stories." Young Duntrum, which had admired John quite long enough, was delighted to hear that so popular a girl as Marion Wamphrey did not want to hear the story which all the others had held their breath at. It was a victory, after all, for Duntrum over the invader in their midst. And accordingly they circled round him, and called attention to a hundred insignificant things.
"Did you hear the meet was at the Four Elms to-morrow, Percival?" "Man, do you know there's every prospect of a fine frost?" "Percival, my sister has a word to say to you about the Philharmonic." "Percival, I'm saying – " He had to stop again and again to respond to their appeals; while, on the other hand, his companion Maxwell shuffled impatiently about, waiting, and grumbled: "Come on, man, never mind, – be done with your civilities. She will have given away every dance before we get near her." Finally, John found himself standing face to face with this strange heroine of his thoughts. He said to himself that, but for her own looks, he might have been shaken in his conviction that it was she. The face that he saw before him, with hair smooth as satin, and crowned with flowers, as was then the fashion, in the midst of the ball was difficult to associate with the ruffled aspect, the flush of excitement, the strange light in the eyes of the woman at the coach door. But she stood straight up to meet him, like one who is strongly set in her own defence, as if she were standing at the bar: and there was in her eyes a watchfulness, a preparedness, as of a man who keeps his arm ready to return a blow. Perhaps all this was merely in John's eyes. Maxwell seemed to see nothing unusual in the look or air of the girl whom he admired. The gay group around fluttered and jested. Nobody within sight or hearing had the slightest suspicion of anything in Marion Wamphrey that was not always there. She did not hold out her hand to him, welcoming the stranger as the other frank and kindly maidens would have done; but that was because Miss Marion was always a little high and mighty, and now and then put on airs, as one who had been out in the world and knew the fashion.
"You mustn't think anything of that," Maxwell said afterwards; "it is just her way. I like her to have a way of her own, not like all the rest," said the young man in love. But John Percival was not satisfied that it was her way. She seemed to look at him in the eyes as if trying to cow him – as if on the faintest movement on his part she were ready to strike. And this on his part excited him, and made him anxious to strike.
"I think," he said, "that Miss Wamphrey and I have met before – "
"I told you so," said Maxwell, – "I told you both so. I was certain you must have met before."
If this ass had not broken in with his assurances about a thing he could know nothing whatever about, John felt sure she would have shown more consciousness than she did. As it was, her colour, he was sure, wavered a little; but she said, with a little burst of laughing surprise: "Oh, how condescending of you to remember! I recollect well seeing you, Mr Percival. But it was only seeing you, not meeting; for you were at the grand end of the Assembly Rooms, among all the lady patronesses, and I was only at the foot of the room, and knew nobody."
"There's one for you, Percival," said Maxwell, delightedly. Though John, it was certain, had had a great succès in Duntrum, they were all coming to think that it might do him good to be a little taken down.
"That is very hard upon me, especially as it was so much to my loss," said John; and then he thought he would carry the war into the enemy's country. "But I confess," he added, "I remember nothing about the Assembly Rooms. I think we have met in other circumstances."
She gave him a broad look from her fully opened eyes, with a faint elevation of the eyebrows.
"There I confess you have the advantage of me," she said steadily, holding him with that look, "as I, it appears, had of you on the former occasion." Then, with the faintest turn of her head, too dignified to be called a toss, she withdrew this embarrassing look from him, with a wave towards Maxwell of the card attached to her fan. "If you want any dances from me," she said, "it will be better not to lose any time."
"You cruel Marion," cried the young man, "it is all filled up, every line."
"You should not have been so late," she said, with a laugh; and they stood for a moment with their heads together, in the easy intimacy of having known each other all their lives. And then followed a little ball-room battle, while John stood, somewhat grim, looking on.
"I that was going to ask how many you would give me!" from him, with tender reproach; and "There will always be the extras, you know," from her.
"And it's easy to mistake about an extra – if you'll be good," said Maxwell, in a lively whisper; and they laughed together over the card, which he was manipulating. John was determined he would hold his ground. She was a very pretty girl, and she was in a state of suppressed excitement (or at least he thought so), which made her doubly interesting. And it was he who was the cause of her excitement. Whatever is the reason, it pleases a man, at least of John's age, to feel that he is the cause of a woman's emotion. He was not daunted by the persiflage but waited calmly till the end of the discussion; then he said —
"Is there no hope, Miss Wamphrey, for me?"
"Oh, Mr Percival," she said, turning round with an air of having forgotten him, which would have done no discredit to a great lady at a court balclass="underline" and then she shook her head. "I am afraid no more than there would have been for me at the Assembly Rooms if I had aspired to dance with one of the stewards," she said, laughing; "but you can look for yourself."
"Come, give him the last of the extras, Marion," said Maxwell, delighted to exercise a little patronage.
"If you are not at home and fast asleep before that," said Marion, raising her eyes quickly, with a dart, to John's face.
He felt it like a blow, but very carefully inscribed his name at the very bottom of her list, and retired with a bow of much dignity – at which, with secret wrath, he heard her laugh with Maxwell as he turned away. It was to be war then? She meant to turn him into ridicule before he could unmask her as the heroine of the strange adventure which everybody knew. John was very moody all the evening, and did not half fulfil the expectations of the merry country ladies, who thought it was the business of their partners to be amusing as well as to dance well. John fulfilled the latter requirement, but then they all danced well at Duntrum. They did not know the waltz in those days. They danced pretty figures of country-dances and reels, and other cheerful things. It had never occurred to them that quadrilles were dull – they were the height of the fashion, and the different figures respected as almost a revelation. Nobody "sat out," and if perhaps the assembly was simple, and some of the dances a little old-fashioned, it was very gay.