But his courage apparently failed him, for he and his wife advanced to the “thrones” and seated themselves. No one else sat, the men moving about to get the partners indicated on the little gilt-edged crested cards they had found in envelopes addressed to them and laid upon the tables in the coat-rooms. Frothingham examined Elsie Pope and saw that she was small and slight, square in the shoulders, thin in the neck, her hair of an uncertain shade of brown, her eyes commonplace, her features irregular. “She looks a good-tempered soul,” he said to himself, searching resolutely for merits. And then he noted that her hands were red, and that she had flat, rather wide wrists. “A good, plain soul,” he added. He sat silent, waiting for her to begin to entertain him--he hadn’t got used to the American custom of the men entertaining the women; and the New York and Boston women, acquainted with the British way, had humoured him. But he waited in vain. At last he stole a glance at her, and noted a gleam in the corner of her eye, the flutter of a humour-curve at the corner of her mouth. “A shrewd little thing, I suspect,” he thought. And he said to her, “No--really, I don’t bite.” Her eyes twinkled. “I was beginning to be afraid you didn’t bark, either,” she said. His expression retired behind his eyeglass. “Nor do I, unless I’m bid.” “I like to be talked to--I’d so much rather criticise than be criticised.” “What do you like to hear about?” he asked. “About the man who’s talking. It’s the only subject he’ll really put his heart into, isn’t it?” Frothingham smiled faintly, as if greeting an old and not especially admired acquaintance. “I’m so disappointed,” she said presently. “All winter I’ve had the same man take me in everywhere--you know, we follow precedence very closely here in Washington. And, when I found I was to have a new man, I had _such_ hopes. The other man and I had got bored to death with each other. And now--you’re threatening to be a failure!” Frothingham did not like this--it was pert for a woman to speak thus to him; he resented it as a man and he resented it as Lord Frothingham. “That’s a jest, ain’t it?” he drawled. “We English, you know, have a horribly defective sense of American humour.” “No, it wasn’t a jest,” she replied. “It was a rudeness, and I beg your pardon. I thought to say something smart, and--I missed. Let’s change the subject. Do you see that intellectual-looking man with the beard on the other side of the table--next to Ysobel Ballantyne?” “The surly chap?” “Yes--and he’s surly because mamma has made a dreadful mistake. She’s put him two below the place his rank entitles him to. He’ll act like a savage all evening.” “Fancy! What a small matter to fly into a rage over.” “A small matter for a large man, but a large matter for a small man. Sometimes I think all men are small. They’re much vainer than women!” “Why do you say that?”