I hardly notice that he is leading me away from the ballroom--down the long corridor, on which almost all the sitting-rooms open. They are, one and all, lit up to-night; and in each of them there are guests. I glance in at the drawing-room: they are not there! We take a turn in the conservatory. We find Mr. Parker sitting very carefully upright, for his costume does not allow of any lolling, or of any tricks being played with it under a magnolia, with a pretty girl--(I wonder, have _my_ cheeks grown as streaky as his?)--but they are not there. We go back to the corridor. We peep into the library: two or three bored old gentlemen--martyrs to their daughters' prospects--yawning over the papers and looking at their watches. They are not here. Where _can_ they be? Only one room yet remains--one room at the very end of the passage--the billiard-room, shut off by double doors to deaden the sound of the balls. One of the double doors is wide open, the other closed--not absolutely _shut_, but not ajar. Musgrave pushes it, and we look in. I do not know why I do. I do not expect to see any one. I hardly think it will be lit, probably blank darkness will meet us. But it is not so. The lamps above the table are shining subduedly under their green shades; and on a couch against the wall two people are sitting. They _are_ here. I found them at last. Evidently they are in deep and absorbing talk. Roger's elbow rests on the top of the couch. His head is on his hand. On his face there is an expression of grave and serious concern; and she--she--is it _possible_?--she is evidently--plainly weeping. Her face is hidden in her handkerchief, and she is sobbing quietly, but quite audibly. In an instant, with ostentatious hurry, Musgrave has reclosed the door, and we stand together in the passage. I am not mistaken now: I could not be: that can be no other expression than triumph that so darkly shines in his great and eager eyes. "You _knew_ they were there!" I cry in a whisper of passionate resentment, snatching my hand from his arm; "you brought me here _on purpose_!" Then, regardless of appearances, I turn quickly away, and walk back down the passage alone! CHAPTER XLVII. This is how the ball ends for me. As soon as I am out of sight, I quicken my walk into a run, and, flying up the stairs, take refuge in my bedroom. Nor do I emerge thence again. The ball itself goes on for hours. The drawing-room is directly beneath me. It seems to me as if the sound of the fiddling, of the pounding, scampering feet would never, never end. I believe, at least I hear afterward, that Mr. Parker, whose spirits go on rising with the steady speed of quicksilver in fine weather, declines to allow his guests to depart, countermands their carriages, bribes their servants, and, in short, reaches the pitch of joyfully confident faith to which all things seem not only _possible_, but extremely desirable, and in whose eyes the mango-tree feat would appear but a childish trifle.