Part 10 (2/2)

Christmas Eve party it should be at the moment when Mr. Rufus Gray and his niece Roberta were dancing a quadrille together. Richard had just been received by his hosts and had turned from them to look about him, when his searching eye caught sight of the pair. This was the precise moment--he always afterward recalled it--when his heart gave its first great, disconcerting leap at sight of her, such a leap as he had never known could shake a man to the foundations.

He had never seen precisely this Roberta before; he explained it to himself in that way. It was a good explanation. Any sane man who saw her for the first time that night must instantly have fallen under her spell.

The Christmas party was the event of the year dearest to Roberta's heart. The planning for it, since she had been old enough to take her part, had been in her hands; it was she who was responsible for every detail of decoration. The great attic room, which was a glorious playroom the rest of the year, was transformed on Christmas into a fairyland. The results were brought about in much the same way as in other places of revelry, with lighting and draping and the use of evergreens and flowers; but somehow one felt that no drawing-room similarly treated could have been half so charming as the big attic s.p.a.ces with their gables.

And the company! At first Richard saw only the pair who danced together in the quadrille. If he had glanced about him he might have observed that the gaze of nearly all who were not dancing was centred upon those two.

Uncle Rufus was the plumpest, jolliest, most altogether delightful specimen of the country gentleman that Richard had ever seen. His ruddy face was clean-shaven, his heavy gray hair waved a little with a boyish effect about his ears. He was carefully dressed in a frock coat of a cut not so ancient as to be at all odd, and it fitted his broad shoulders with precision. He wore a white waistcoat and a flowing black tie, which helped to carry out the impression of his being a boy whose hair had accidentally turned gray. As he danced he put every possible embellishment of posture and step into his task, and when he bowed to Roberta his att.i.tude expressed the deepest reverence, offset only by his laughing face as he advanced to take her hand.

But as for the girl herself--what was she? A beauty stepping out of a portrait by one of the masters? She wore her grandmother's ball gown of rose-coloured brocade, and her hair was arranged in the fas.h.i.+on that went with it, small curls escaping from the knot at the back of her head, a style which set off her radiant face with peculiarly piquant effect. Her cheeks matched her frock, and her eyes--what were her eyes?

Black stars, or wells of darkness into which a man might fall and drown himself?

She seemed to draw to herself, as she danced, among the soberer colours of her elders and the white frocks of the country cousins, all the light in the room. ”I would look at something else if I could,” thought Richard to himself, ”but it would be only a blur to me after looking at her.”

When Roberta returned Uncle Rufus's bow it was with a posturing such as Richard had seen only in plays; it struck him now that the graceful droop of her whole figure to the floor was the most perfect thing he had ever seen; and when her head came up and he saw her laughing face lift again to meet her partner's, he considered the boyish old gentleman who took her hand and led her on in the intricate figures of the dance a person to be envied.

”Aren't Rob and Uncle Rufus the greatest couple you ever laid eyes on?”

exulted Louis Gray, coming up to greet him. ”The next is going to be a waltz. Will you ask Mrs. Stephen? We'll let you begin easily, but shall expect you to end by dancing with Aunt Ruth, Uncle Rufus's wife--which will be no hards.h.i.+p when you really know her, I a.s.sure you. We indulge in no ultra-modern dances on Christmas Eve, you see, and have no dance-cards; it's always part of the fun to watch the scramble for partners when the number is announced.”

So presently Richard found himself upon the floor with little Mrs.

Stephen Gray, waltzing with her according to his own discretion, though all around them were dancers whose steps ranged from present-day methods to the ancient fas.h.i.+on of turning round and round without ever a reverse. He saw Roberta herself revolving in slow circles in an endless spiral, piloted by the proud arm of Mr. Philip Gray. She nodded at him past her uncle's shoulder, and he wondered seriously if she meant to dance with elderly uncles all the evening.

Before he could approach her she was off in the next dance with a young cousin, a lad of seventeen. Richard himself took out one of the country cousins to whom Mrs. Stephen had presented him, a very pretty, fair-haired girl in white muslin and blue ribbons; and he did his best to give her a good time. He found her pleasant company, as Mrs. Stephen had prophesied, and at another time--any time--before he came into the attic room to-night, he might have found no little enjoyment in her bright society. But in his present condition his one hope and endeavour was to get the queen of the revels, the rose of the garden, into his possession.

With this end in view he faithfully devoted himself to whatever partner was given him by Louis, who had taken him in charge and was enjoying to the full the spectacle of ”Rich” Kendrick exerting himself, as he had probably never done before, to give pleasure to those with whom he was thrown. At last Fate and Roberta were kind to him. It was Louis, however, who manipulated Fate in his behalf.

Catching his sister as one of her cousins, a young son of Uncle Henry, released her, Louis drew her into a corner--as much of a corner as one could get into with a sister at whom, wherever she turned, half the company was looking.

”See here, Rob, you're not playing fair with the guest. Here's the evening half over and you haven't given him a solitary chance. What's the matter? You're not afraid of His Highness?”

”This is a dance for the uncles and cousins,” retorted Roberta, ”not for society young men.”

”But he's done his duty like a man and a brother. He's danced with aunts and cousins, too, and has done it as if it were the joy of his life. But I know what he wants and I think he deserves a reward. The next waltz will be a peach, 'Roses Red.' Give it to the poor young millionaire, Robby; there's a good girl.”

”Bring him here,” said she with an air of resignation, and she turned to a group of young people who had followed her as bees follow their queen.

”Not this time, dears,” said she. ”I'm engaged for this dance to a poor young man who has wandered in here and must be made to feel at home.”

”Is that the one?” asked one of the pretty country cousins, indicating Richard, who, obeying Louis's beckoning hand, was crossing the floor in their direction. ”Oh, you won't mind dancing with him. He's as nice as he is good-looking, too.”

”I'm delighted to hear it,” said Roberta.

The next minute ”the poor young man” was before her. ”Am I really to have it?” he asked her. ”Will you give me the whole of it and not cut it in two, as I saw you do with the last one?”

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