Sir
Donald's manner lost its self-consciousness, its furtive diffidence.
"You--you come and give my house its real baptism," he said, with a flash
of ardour that, issuing from him, was like fire bursting out of a dreary
marsh land. "Will you? This August?"
"But," she hesitated. "Isn't Mr. Carey coming?"
At this moment they came into a big drawing-room that immediately
preceded the ballroom, with which it communicated by an immense doorway
hung with curtains of white velvet. They could see in the distance the
dancers moving rather indifferently in a lancers. Lord Holme and Miss
Schley were dancing in the set nearest to the doorway, and on the side
that faced the drawing-room. Directly Lady Holme saw the ballroom she saw
them. A sudden sense of revolt, the defiance of joy carried on into the
defiance of anger, rose up in her.
"If Mr. Carey is coming I'll come too, and baptise your house," she said.
Sir Donald looked surprised, but he answered, with a swiftness that did
not seem to belong to old age:
"That is a bargain, Lady Holme. I regard that as a bargain."
"I'll not go back on it."
There was a hard sound in her voice.
They entered the ballroom just as the band played the closing bars of the
lancers, and the many sets began to break up and melt into a formless
crowd which dispersed in various directions. The largest number of people
moved towards the archway near which the Duke was still sitting, bravely
exerting himself to be cheerful.
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