eel much indebted
to you, sir, if you bring back the flower, because I have promised Miss
Douglas that she should have it, and should be obliged to go for it
myself, ignorant as I am, were it not for your kindness."

He raised his hat courteously, and went off with Anne to join the
others, already out of sight.

"I suppose he does not approve of the dancing," said the girl, looking
back.

But Dexter did not care whether he approved or disapproved; he had
already dismissed the dominie from his mind.

The path took them to a deserted stone-quarry in the side of the hill.
There was the usual yawning pit, floored with broken jagged masses, and
chips of stone, the straight bare wall of rock above, and the forest
greenery coming to the edge of the desolation on all sides, and leaning
over to peep down. The quarrymen had camped below, and the little open
space where once their lodge of boughs had stood was selected by Isabel
for the dancing floor. The harpist, a small old man clad in a grimy
velveteen coat, played a waltz, to which the little Italian boy added a
lagging accompaniment; the monkey, who seemed to have belonged to some
defunct hand-organ, sat on a stump and surveyed the scene. They did not
all dance, but Isabel succeeded in persuading a few to move through a
quadrille whose figures she improvised for the occasion. But the scene
was more picturesque when, after a time, the dull partners in coats were
discarded, and the floating draperies danced by themselves, joining
hands in a ring, and circling round and round with merry little motions
which were charmingly pretty, like kittens at play. Then they made the
boy sing, and he chanted a tune which had (musically) neither beginning
nor end, but a useful quality of going on forever. But whatever he did,
and whatever they gave him, made no difference in his settled
melancholy, which the monkey's small face seemed to caricature. Then
they danced again, and this time Dexter took part, while the other
coated ones remained on the grass, smoking. It ended in his waltzing
with them all in turn, and being overwhelmed with their praises, which,
however, being levelled at the heads of the others by strongly implied
comparison, were not as valuable as they seemed. Dexter knew that he
gained nothing by joining in that dance; but where there was something
to do, he could not resist doing it. When the waltz was over, and the
wandering musicians sent on their way with a lavish rew