e. The
leader of cotillions--"

"That's the second time I've had that accusation flung at me under this
roof," said he, and his face clouded as quickly as it had lighted. "I am
beginning to wonder what kind of a crime you people think it to be a
leader of cotillions. As a matter of fact, I'm not one, for I never
accept the part when I can by any chance get out of it."

"You have the enviable reputation of being the most accomplished person
in that role the town can produce. You should be proud of it."

He pulled up a chair in front of her and sat down, looking--or trying to
look--straight into her eyes.

"See here, Miss Gray," said he with sudden earnestness, "if that's the
only thing you think I can do you're certainly rating me pretty low."

"I'm not rating you at all. I don't know enough about you."

"That's a harder blow than the other one." He tried to speak lightly,
but chagrin was in his face. "If you'd just added 'and don't want to
know' you'd have finished your work of making me feel about three feet
high."

"Would you prefer to be made to feel eight feet? Plenty of people will
do that for you. You see I so often find a yardstick measures my own
height, I know the humiliating sensation it is. And I'm never more
convinced of my own smallness than when I see my uncles and their
families at Christmas, especially Uncle Rufus. Do you know which one he
is?"

"You were dancing with him when I came in."

"I didn't see you come in."

"I might have known that," he admitted with a rueful laugh. "Well, did
you dance an old-fashioned square dance with him, and is he a delightful
looking, elderly gentleman with a face like a jolly boy?"

"Exactly that--and he's a boy in heart, too, but a man in mind. I wonder
if--"

"He'd care to meet me? I'm sure you weren't going to ask if I'd care to
meet him. But I'd consider it an honour if he'd let me be presented to
him."

"Now you're talking properly," said she. "It is an honour to be allowed
to know Uncle Rufus, and I think you'll feel it so." She rose.

He got up reluctantly. "Thank you, I certainly shall," said he quite
soberly. "But--must we go this minute? Surely you can sit out one
number, and I'll promise after that to stand on my head and dance with a
broomstick if it will please your guests."

"I've a mind to hold you to that offer," said she, with mischief in her
eyes. "But the next number is the old-time 'Lancers,' and I'm needed.
Should you like to dan