bbons. At eight
o'clock she was ordered up to bed and there was a great uproar, before,
striking out in all directions, she was carried upstairs under Joanna's
stalwart arm. The Rye Quartet tactfully started playing to drown her
screams, which continued for some time in the room overhead.

The party did not break up till eleven, having spent five hours standing
squeezed like herrings under the Ansdore beams, eating and drinking and
talking, to the strains of "The Blue Danube" and "See Me Dance the
Polka." Local opinion was a little bewildered by the entertainment--it
had been splendid, no doubt, and high-class to an overwhelming degree,
but it had been distinctly uncomfortable, even tiresome, and a great
many people were upset by eating too much, since the refreshments had
been served untiringly from six to eleven, while others had not had
enough, being nervous of eating their food so far from a table, and
clinging throughout the evening to their first helpings.

To Joanna, however, the evening was an uncriticized success, and she was
inspired to repeat it on a humbler scale for the benefit of her
servants. She knew that at big houses there was often a servants' ball
at Christmas, and though she had at present no definite ambition to push
herself into the Manor Class, she was anxious that Ansdore should have
every pomp and that things should be "done proper." The mere solid
comfort of prosperity was not enough for her--she wanted the glitter and
glamour of it as well, she wanted her neighbours not only to realize it
but to exclaim about it.

Thus inspired she asked Prickett, Vine, Furnese and other yeomen and
tenants of the Marsh to send their hands, men and maids, to Ansdore, for
dancing and supper on New Year's Eve. She found this celebration even
more thrilling than the earlier one. Somehow these humbler preparations
filled more of her time and thought than when she had prepared to
entertain her peers. She would not wear her low dress, of course, but
she would have her pink one "done up"--a fall of lace and some beads
sewn on, for she must look her best. She saw herself opening the ball
with Dick Socknersh, her hand in his, his clumsy arm round her waist....
Of course old Stuppeny was technically the head man at Ansdore, but he
was too old to dance--she would see he had plenty to eat and drink
instead--she would take the floor with Dick Socknersh, and all eyes
would be fixed upon her.

They certainly were, except