She laid her arm on his, her hand in his; Silvette, playing, turned her head to watch them. "He _is_ a rotten dancer," she said critically. "I can’t help that," said Diana; "it was the time and the hour. I needed it! ... Jim, don’t step on my toe, please, and don’t _think_ of stopping. You do well enough, really, you do.... No man who counts dances like a Turveydrop.... We use dancing men for dancing purposes only.... Of course you are flattered; I meant to flatter you, so you wouldn’t be horrid enough to stop.... Please finish glaring at me; you are really giving me a great deal of pleasure." "I begin to wonder whether I was not created for that, Japonette." "To amuse me? Unintentionally? perhaps." "So that you notice me at all, it doesn’t matter," he said under his breath. "Goodness! what meekness! Only that you’re a typical man and don’t mean it, I’d hate you for it.... A meek man—from him, good Lord, deliver us! ... No, cousin, there is that in your eye which—and in your general make-up——" "What?" "Oh, I don’t know—thirty-odd masculine years—_very_ masculine!—or I’d not be dancing with you, or I’d not be in this house at this moment; or, rather, _you_ wouldn’t. Stop mincing along in a horrid sort of self-satisfied prance! ... And don’t hop, either! Are you tiring?" "No," he said bravely. "I’ll let you go in a moment, before you swoon and I have to drag you to a chair.... You dance well enough. I like it, really ... and—thank you very much indeed!" They parted, breathless. She stood a moment waving her fan against her bright cheeks and touching her hair with cleft fingers. He extracted a handkerchief from his sleeve and used it frankly. "It’s hot in here," he said; "show me your roof garden." "Silvette," she called over her shoulder, "will you come up to the roof?" Silvette nodded and continued playing an air from "Armide"; and they waited for her a moment, then went out into the hallway and up to the roof. "The garden of a thousand delights!" she said with a sweep of her hand and a curtsey. "The Japanese fairy, Japonette, welcomes the true prophet of her frivolity." He looked around at the flowers in pots—geraniums, verbenas, fuchsias, heliotrope—homely, old-fashioned blossoms. "I bought them from a peddler; I stopped his wagon in the street and made him carry them up here. They only cost two dollars; and I was economical at the market," she explained. He glanced up at the awning gay with yellow and white stripes. "Macy’s," she admitted guiltily; "I’ll starve you at dinner to-night to pay for it." He looked at her rather queerly, she thought. "There are things I’d starve for—and people." "And awnings, cousin?" "Yours." "That’s very nice and gallant and obvious," she said in such a tormenting tone that he broke out almost impatiently: "Japonette, can’t you ever take me seriously?" "I hope not, cousin."