obedience to the music
and the swimming atmosphere, so that I did not keenly take note of why
Laura Burnet did not return my bow. Jack Tracy took me in to supper,
and fussed until he found seats for us in the big hall beyond the
supper-room. It appeared he was wanting to propose to me again; and,
as I was ready for anything as far as only making proposals went, I did
not try to stop him. Behind us a curtain hung, the only thing between
us and the ball-room, but the orchestra was still playing softly and
there was hardly any one in that room, so I thought no one could
overhear us.

In the midst of it, Aleppo Mendez put his head in the door and asked
what had Jack done with his partner's program? Jack, not discovering
it in his pocket, very much vexed at being interrupted, went to look
for it with Aleppo in the supper-room, and I was left alone.

For a few moments I sat listening to the music. Then this ended with a
soft chord, and on the other side of the curtain I heard the quick
rustling of a girl's frock, and a girl's voice, "Just wait, I must put
one more hair-pin in it or it never will stay up."

I recognized Estrella's tones. There was a little pause, and then,
evidently resuming the main thread of her discourse she went on, "Of
course, as I was saying, it was awfully brave of her to do it, but how
could she! Why, if I had been in such a position just thinking what it
would have meant to him, I know I couldn't have made a sound!"

"Well, if I could I wouldn't have!" It was Laura speaking with great
bitterness. "It wasn't as if she had to tell. She was the only one in
the city who saw it. No one would have known anything if only she had
held her tongue!"

"Oh, but," Estrella broke in, in a deprecating voice, "it was an awful
thing he did!"

"Oh, was it?" Laura retorted scornfully, "Lots of men do the same thing
and aren't so very bad; and lots more would do it if they dared. Just
because he is handsomer and braver and has a higher temper than most,
lots of people hate him. And because Ellie Fenwick is little and looks
young, and every one was saying how pale and pathetic she looked and
how convincing it was, the way she told her story, oh, I heard the talk
all around the court room!--she just worked on the sympathies of the
jury! It wasn't justice that convicted him! It was Ellie Fenwick!"

I sat perfectly still, grasping my cold little ice-cream plate in one
hand, not hearing anything more,