was eager.

"The first--at least," she said.

With a faint satisfied smile he turned and moved away.

Dinner that night was a very lively meal. Everybody seemed imbued with
the spirit of the coming ball, and anxious to display a personal sense
of anticipation. After the company had risen from table, Clodagh and
Nance met again in the hall by previous arrangement and retired to
their rooms, that Simonetta might put some finishing touches to their
hair and dresses, and that they might get the bouquets they were to
carry at the dance.

As they mounted the staircase side by side, Nance, after the custom of
old days, slipped her arm through her sister's.

"Clo!" she said softly, "you are excited too! I can feel it!"

Clodagh smile a little.

"Well, it is my first dance!"

Nance halted and looked at her.

"Why, of course it is! And you must feel like I did the night of Mrs.
Estcoit's ball--the night----" She stopped, blushing.

"Oh, darling," she added, "fancy my not realising that you had never
been to a dance? It must feel lovely and strange to you!"

Clodagh drew her onward up the stairs.

"Yes; it does feel different from anything else. Of course, I shan't
dance; but then people may ask me to--to sit out."

"_May?_ I wonder who _won't_ ask you!"

Nance's eyes spoke volumes, as they travelled from her sister's face to
the long lines of her soft black dress.

Arrested by the look, Clodagh spoke again, abruptly and a little
anxiously.

"Nance, why do you say that?"

"Say what?"

"That people would ask me for dances--that people would care?"

Again Nance paused and looked at her.

"I am nearly angry with you, for asking anything so silly," she said
after a second's pause. "But I won't be. I'll forgive you. Though you
know perfectly well that there isn't a man here who wouldn't sit
out--or dance--or do anything in the world with you, from now till
Doomsday."

She looked up laughingly; but, as she did so, her expression fell.

"Clo, you're angry?"

Clodagh patted the hand that lay upon her wrist.

"Angry, darling? No! Only thinking how wrong you are."

"Wrong?"

"Yes; I know one man who would not dance with me, even if--if I were to
offer him a dance----"

She made the confession swiftly, in obedience to a sudden impulse.

Nance looked at her afresh in involuntary curiosity.

"Clo----"

But Clodagh raised her head, in a half-defiant return to reticence.

"Don't mind me!" she said. "Aft