very
plain to him that she had got the better of him by some deceit. He
would smile, and smile, and smile during the evening; but he would
have it out with Mrs. Tappitt before he would allow that lady to have
any rest. He lingered in the room, pretending that he was overlooking
the arrangements, but in truth he was counting the bottles. After
all there was but a dozen. He knew that at Griggs's they sold it for
sixty shillings. "Three pounds!" he said to himself. "Three pounds
more; dear, dear!"

"Yes, it is nice!" he said to Rachel. "Mind you get a glass of
champagne when you go in to supper. By-the-by, shall I get a partner
for you? Here, Buckett, come and dance the next dance with Miss Ray."
Buckett was the clerk in the brewery. Rachel had nothing to say for
herself; so Buckett's name was put down on the card, though she would
rather not have danced with Buckett. A week or two ago, before she
had been taken up into Mrs. Cornbury's carriage, or had waltzed with
Mrs. Cornbury's cousin, or had looked at the setting sun with Luke
Rowan, she would have been sufficiently contented to dance with Mr.
Buckett,--if in those days she had ever dreamed of dancing with any
one. Then Mrs. Cornbury came to her again, bringing other cavaliers,
and Rachel's card began to be filled. "The quadrille before supper
you dance with me," said Walter Cornbury. "That's settled, you know."
Oh, what a new world it was, and so different from the Dorcas
meetings at Miss Pucker's rooms!

Then came the moment of the evening which, of all the moments, was
the most trying to her. Luke Rowan came to claim her hand for the
next quadrille. She had already spoken to him,--or rather he to her;
but that had been in the presence of a third person, when, of course,
nothing could be said about the sunset and the clouds,--nothing about
that promise of friendship. But now she would have to stand again
with him in solitude,--a solitude of another kind,--in a solitude
which was authorized, during which he might whisper what words he
pleased to her, and from which she could not even run away. It had
been thought to be a great sin on her part to have remained a moment
with him by the stile; but now she was to stand up with him beneath
the glare of the lights, dressed in her best, on purpose that he
might whisper to her what words he pleased. But she was sure--she
thought that she was sure, that he would utter no words so sweet, so
full of meaning, as those in which