grave.

As Lady Coleville emerged from the ladies' cloakroom, attended by her
pretty bevy, Sir Peter, followed by his guests, awaited her in the
great corridor, where she took his arm, looking up into his handsome
face with that indefinable smile I knew so well--a smile of delicate
pride, partly tender, partly humorous, tinctured with faintest
coquetry.

"Sweetheart," he said, "that villain, Carus, will have none of our
match-making, and I hope Rosamund twists him into a triple
lover's-knot, to teach him lessons he might learn more innocently."

Lady Coleville flushed up and looked around at me. "Why, Carus," she
said softly, "I thought you a man of sense and discretion."

"But I--but she does not favor me, madam," I protested in a low voice.

"It is your fault, then, and your misfortune," she said. "Do you not
know that she leaves us to-morrow? Sir Henry has placed a packet at our
service. Can you not be persuaded--for my sake? It is our fond wish,
Carus. How can a man be insensible to such wholesome loveliness as
hers?"

"But--but she is a child--she has no heart! She is but a child yet--all
caprice, innocence, and artless babble--and she loves not me,
madam----"

"_You_ love not _her_! Shame, sir! Open those brown blind eyes of yours,
that look so wise and are so shallow if such sweetness as hers troubles
not their depths! Oh, Carus, Carus, you make me too unhappy!"

"Idiot!" added Sir Peter, pinching my arm. "Bring her to us, now, for
we enter. She is yonder, you slow-wit! nose to nose with O'Neil.
Hasten!"

But Elsin's patch-box had been mislaid, and while we searched for it I
saw the marines march up, form in double rank, and heard the clear
voice of their sergeant announcing:

"Sir Peter and Lady Coleville!

"Captain Tully O'Neil and the Misses O'Neil!

"Adjutant-General De Lancey and Miss Beekman!

"Sir Henry Clinton!

"Captains Harkness, Rutherford, Hallowell, and McIvor!

"Major-General----"

"Elsin," I said, "you should have been announced with Sir Peter and
Lady Coleville!"

She had found her patch-box and her fan at length, and we marched in,
the sergeant's loud announcement ringing through the quickly filling
room:

"Mr. Carus Renault and the Honorable Elsin Grey!"

"What _will_ folk say to hear our banns shouted aloud in the teeth of
all New York?" she whispered mischievously. "Mercy on me! if you turn as
red as a Bushwick pippin they will declare we are affianced!"

"I shall