re flushed velvet, your cheeks are
peaches under cream, your eyes are blue absinthe and your mouth a red
devil. Come on before I get drunk looking at you." I didn't know whether
I liked that or not and turned down the light quickly myself and went to
the gate hurriedly. Tom laughed and behaved himself.

[Illustration: "Molly, you are one lovely dream"]

Everybody in town was up to the hotel and everybody was nice to me,
girls and all. There is a bunch of lovely posy girls in this town and
they were all in full flower. Most of the men were college boys home for
vacation, and while they are a few years younger than me, I have been
friends with them for always and they know how I dance. I didn't even
get near enough to the wall to know it was there, though I was conscious
of Aunt Bettie and Mrs. Johnson sitting on it at one end of the room,
and every time I passed them I flirted with them until I won a smile
from them both. I wish I could be sure of hearing Mrs. Johnson tell Aunt
Adeline all about it.

And it was well I did come to save Ruth Chester from a dancing death,
for she is as light as a feather and sails on the air like thistle-down.
I felt sorry for Tom, for when he danced with me he could see her, and
when he danced with her I pouted at him, even over Judge Wade's arm. I
verily believe it was from being really rattled that he asked little Pet
Buford to dance with him--by mistake as it were. After that if Pet
breathed a single strain of music out of his arms I didn't see it. I
knew that gone expression on his face and it made me feel so lonesome
that I was more gracious to the judge than was exactly safe. He dances
just as magnificently as he exists in life and it is a kind of
ceremonial to do it with him. The boys all wore white flannels, and most
of the men, but the judge was as formally dressed as he would have been
in mid-winter, and I wondered if Alfred could be half as distinguished
to look at. I suppose my eyes must have been telling on me about how
grand I thought he was looking because he--well, I was rather relieved
when one of the boys took me out of his arms for a good, long, swinging
two-step.

And how I did enjoy it all, every single minute of it! My heart beat
time to the music as if it would never tire of doing so. Miss Chester
and I exchanged little laughs and scraps of conversation in between
times and I fell deeper and deeper in love with her. Every pound I have
melted and frozen and starve