Amy Rivers laughed. “That’s generalizing. But it was different last night, because, so to speak, I’m a member of the household here. A ward counts as a sort of niece, doesn’t she? Or between that and an adopted daughter? But, anyway, it was out of sheer pity for Mr. Onslow in the first instance, and it was with distinct qualms that I let him take me down to dance. I quite intended, after half a round, to say the room was too crowded, and go and sit somewhere. That is to say, I made up my mind to do this when he asked me. However, when I dropped my fingers on his arm to go down-stairs, I had my doubts. You know after two seasons one gets instinctively to know by the first touch how a man will dance. And when he put his arm around me, and we moved to the music, I felt like going on forever. Waltzing is hard just now, because it’s in a transition state between two styles; but his dancing was something to dream about. We started off with the newest quick waltz. Hamilton, it was just lovely! He was so perfect that just for experiment I altered my step—by degrees, you know. Automatically, and without anything being seen, he changed too; and we were dancing the old slow glide before I knew. And his steering was perfect. In that whirling, teeming, tangled mob he never bumped me once. I gave him two more waltzes, and cut another couple in his favor.” “Which makes five in all,” said Fairfax, rather stiffly. Amy Rivers took his hand and patted it. “Don’t be cross, dear. You know how I love a good dance, and one doesn’t meet a partner like Mr. Onslow every day. I suppose he’s done his waltzing in Vienna and Paris, and Yorkshire, and New Orleans, as well as here in London; and by averaging them all up he can’t help but be good.” “Is it from going to those places that Mrs. Shelf called him the Great Traveler?” “Of course not! Hamilton, how stupid you are about him! Why, he’s rummaged about in every back corner of the world, so they say.” “So they say, yes! Teheran to Timbuctoo. But what does he say himself about his wanderings beyond the tram-lines? Shuffles mostly, doesn’t he? And who’s met him anywhere? Not a soul will come forward to speak. I tell you, Amy, there’s something uncanny about this Patrick Onslow. He turns up here periodically in London after some vague exploring trip to a place that isn’t mapped, and you can never pin him to tell exactly where he’s been. He comes with money, spends it _en prince_, and then goes off again, nominally perhaps to the Gobi Desert, and returns with another cargo.” “How romantic!” said Miss Rivers. “Yes, isn’t it?” said her _fiancé_ drily. “If he’d lived a century earlier, one would have said he’d got a sound business connection as a pirate somewhere West Indies way. As this year is eighteen ninety-three, and that explanation’s barred, one simply has to accept him as an uncomfortable mystery.” “Hamilton, how absurd you are! Wherever did all this rigmarole come from?”