Hubert Wesson, as his eyes met Mrs. Hazeldean’s, crimsoned to the forehead, hung back a moment, and then came forward, bowing low--again that too low bow! “So _he_ saw me too,” she thought. She put her hand on his arm with a laugh. “Dear me, how ceremonious you are! Really, I’m not as old as that bow of yours implies. My dear boy, I hope you want to take me in to supper at once. I was out in the cold all the afternoon, gazing at the Fifth Avenue Hotel fire, and I’m simply dying of hunger and fatigue.” There, the die was cast--she had said it loud enough for all the people nearest her to hear! And she was sure now that it was the right, the “natural” thing to do. Her spirits rose, and she sailed into the supper-room like a goddess, steering Hubert to an unoccupied table in a flowery corner. “No--I think we’re very well by ourselves, don’t you? Do you want that fat old bore of a Lucy Vanderlow to join us? If you _do_, of course ... I can see she’s dying to ... but then, I warn you, I shall ask a young man! Let me see--shall I ask Henry Prest? You see he’s hovering! No, it _is_ jollier with just you and me, isn’t it?” She leaned forward a little, resting her chin on her clasped hands, her elbows on the table, in an attitude which the older women thought shockingly free, but the younger ones were beginning to imitate. “And now, some champagne, please--and _hot_ terrapin!... But I suppose you were at the fire yourself, weren’t you?” she leaned still a little nearer to say. The blush again swept over young Wesson’s face, rose to his forehead, and turned the lobes of his large ears to balls of fire (“It looks,” she thought, “as if he had on huge coral earrings.”). But she forced him to look at her, laughed straight into his eyes, and went on: “Did you ever see a funnier sight than all those dressed-up absurdities rushing out into the cold? It looked like the end of an Inauguration Ball! I was so fascinated that I actually pushed my way into the hall. The firemen were furious, but they couldn’t stop me--nobody can stop me at a fire! You should have seen the ladies scuttling downstairs--the fat ones! Oh, but I beg your pardon; I’d forgotten that you admire ... avoirdupois. No? But ... Mrs. Van ... so stupid of me! Why, you’re actually blushing! I assure you, you’re as red as your mother’s fan--and visible from as great a distance! Yes, please; a little more champagne....”