to her as they sat, and
to be her partner in the stray dances which accidentally enlivened the
evening entertainment. She danced well, too, he discovered, and with
such evident enjoyment of her own smooth, swaying movements as was quite
magnetic, and made him half reluctant to release her when their first
waltz was ended, and she stopped all aflush with new bloom.

"I am _so_ fond of dancing," she said, catching her breath in a little
sigh of ecstasy. "We all are. It is one of the things we _can_ do
without spending any money, you know."

It was shortly after this, just as they were standing in twos and
threes, chatting and refreshing themselves with Dolly's confections
and iced lemonade, that an entirely unexpected advent occurred. There
suddenly fell upon the general ear a sound as of rolling wheels, and a
carriage stopped before the door.

Dolly, standing in the midst of a small circle of her own, paused in her
remarks to listen.

"It is a carriage, that is certain," she said,--"and somebody is getting
out. I don't know "--and then a light breaking over her face in a
flash of horror and delight in the situation commingled. "Phil," she
exclaimed, "the Philistines be upon us,--it is Lady Augusta!"

And it was. In two minutes that majestic lady was ushered in by the
excited Belinda, and announced in the following rather remarkable
manner,--

"If yer please, Miss Dolly, here's your aunt, Mr. Phil."

For a second her ladyship was speechless, even though Dolly advanced to
meet her at once. The festive gathering was too much for her, and the
sight of Ralph Gowan leaning over Mollie in all her bravery, holding
her flowers for her, and appearing so evidently at home, overpowered her
completely. But she recovered herself at length.

"I was not aware," she said to Dolly, "that you were having a"--pause
for a word sufficiently significant--"that you were holding a
reception,"--a scathing glance at the pensive Brown, who was at once
annihilated. "You will possibly excuse my involuntary intrusion. I
thought, of _course_" (emphasis), "that I should find you alone, and
as I had something to say to you concerning Euphemia, I decided to
call tonight on my way from the conversazione at Dr. Bugby's,--perhaps,
Dorothea, your friends" (emphasis again) "will excuse you for a moment,
and you will take me into another room,"--this last as if she had
suddenly found herself in a fever hospital and was rather afraid of
contagion.