re
besieged for dances, and divided each.

The older women sat against the wall, a dado of fat and diamonds, and
indulged in much caustic criticism.

The old beaux stood in a group and exchanged opinions on the relative
pretensions of the old and the new.

"Take it all in all, not to compare," said Ben Sansome. "Miss Montgomery
is excessively pretty, but no figure and no style. Miss Brannan looks
like a Parisian cocotte. Miss Folsom has eyes, but nothing else--and
when you think of 'Lupie Hathaway's eyes! And not one has the beginnings
of the polished charm of manner, the fire of glance, the _je ne sais
quoi_ of Mrs. Hunt Maclean. Just look at her in her silver brocade, her
white hair _a la marquise_. She's handsomer than the whole lot of
them--"

At that moment Helena entered the room.

The white tulle gown, made with a half-dozen skirts, floated about her
so lightly that she seemed rising from, suspended above it. Even beside
her father she looked tall; and her neck and arms, the rise of her
girlish bust, were more dazzlingly white than the diaphanous substance
about her. Her haughty little head was set well back on a full firm
throat, not too long. Her cheeks were touched with pink; her lips were
full of it. Her long lashes and low straight brows were many shades
darker than the unruly mane of glittering coppery hair. And she carried
herself with a swing, with an imperious pride, with a nonchalant command
of immediate and unmeasured admiration which sent every maiden's heart
down with a drop and every man's pulses jumping.

"I give in!" gasped Ben Sansome. "We never had anything like
that--never! Gad! the girl's got everything. It's almost unfair."

Alan Rush turned white, but he did not lose his presence of mind. He
asked Don Roberto to present him at once, and secured the next dance. It
was a waltz; and as the admirably mated couple floated down the room,
many others paused to watch them. Helena's limpid eyes, raised to the
eager ones above her, did all the execution of which they were capable.
During the next entre-dance she was mobbed. Twenty men pressed about
her, introduced by Don Roberto and Rollins, until she finally commanded
them to "go away and give her air," then walked off with Eugene Fort,
finishing his first epigram and mocking at his second. He had only a
fourth of the next dance; but as Helena had refused to permit her
admirers to write their names on her card, and as she was at no pains to