"Whoever you are, you seem acquainted with certain youthful adventures. But some one might have told you these things, thinking to annoy me." Then the light in her eyes grew dim with the struggle of retrospection, the effort to pierce the veil of absent years, and to place me among the useless, forgotten things of youth, or rather childhood. "No, I can not place you. Please tell me who you are, if I have ever known you." "Not just now. Mystery arouses a woman's curiosity, and I frankly confess that I wish to arouse yours. You are nearly, if not quite, twenty-four." "One does not win a woman's interest by telling her her age." "But I add that you do not look it." "That is better. Now, let me see the slipper," holding out her hand. "To no one but Cinderella. I'd be a nice prince, wouldn't I, to surrender the slipper without finding Cinderella!" "In these days no woman would permit you to put on her slipper, unless you were her husband or her brother." "No? Then I have a much perverted idea of society." "And,"--passing over my remark, "she would rather sit in a corner all the evening." "But think of the fun you are missing!" "To be frank with you, I am not missing very much fun. I was at a dance last night, and the novelty begins to pall." "At least, then, you will admit that I have proved a diversion." "It will cost me nothing to admit that; but I think you are rude not to tell me right away who you are." She looked out of the blurred windows. Her profile was beautiful to contemplate, and perhaps she knew it. "Why don't you seek a footman," she asked, after a pause, "and have him announce that you have found a slipper?" "Have you no more regard for romance than that?" "You said that I was twenty-four years old. I have less regard for romance than for propriety." "There you go again, battening down the hatches of convention! I am becoming discouraged." "Is it possible? I have long since been." She had always been a match for me. Enter upon the scene (as they say in the play-books) a flurried partner, rather young and tender to be thrown in company with twenty-four years of sparkling femininity. Well, that was his affair; I didn't propose to warn him. "Oh, here you are!" he cried, brightening. "I've been looking for you everywhere,"--making believe that something was the matter with his gloves. "Do you know this gentleman?" she asked, pointing to me with her fan. I felt a nervous tremor. I wondered if she had been waiting for a moment like this. The young fellow held out his hand; his smile was pleasant and inquiring. "Wait a moment," she interrupted wickedly. "I am not introducing you. I am simply asking you if you know him." Wasn't this a capital revenge? "I ... I can't say that I ever saw the gentleman before," he stammered, mightily bewildered. Then all at once his face grew red with anger. He even balled his fists. "Has he dared--"