"Well, now I come to the supreme test of all: do you dance?" Cosden threw up his hands in real despair. "You are making me look ridiculous," he said. "I knew the old dances, but I've never put myself up against the new ones. I suppose I could learn." "Well, well, well!" ejaculated the fair inquisitor. "All I can say is that you showed real business judgment in coming to me first. Merry would have made short work of you; she's crazy about dancing. Oh, don't look so serious; the case may not be so hopeless as it seems." "I don't see how it could be much worse." Cosden was genuinely chagrined. "It isn't every one who finds a fairy godmother waiting for him when he comes out of his chrysalis, Mr. Cosden," Edith explained. "She will help young Lochinvar to throw aside his antiquity and come down to date. In two weeks' time you'll feel so spritely that Mr. Huntington and his friends of equal age will bore you,--all provided that you follow your instructor's precepts." Cosden caught the contagion of her optimism. "It's mighty good of you, Miss Stevens. I have no right to ask so much of a comparative stranger." "Don't worry a bit," Edith reassured him. "You are to start right in and practise on me. I'll teach you the new steps, and coach you in all that's needful. You may lose your breath and a few friends, but I'll guarantee to show you how to win a wife. Now you may begin your education by leading me in to luncheon." * * * * * XII * * * * * Out of the helpless floundering in the lap of his "responsibilities" a realization came to Huntington that immediate action of some sort was imperative to prevent him from breaking his most zealously observed commandment, "Thou shalt not worry." His antipathy to this favorite pastime was not due to an acceptance of the Japanese theory that worry produces poison in the human system, but rather to a willingness on his part to let others do what he himself found distasteful. It was an article of faith with him to avoid the unpleasant. During luncheon Cosden was wrapped in his own thoughts, which gave final opportunity for this realization to crystallize into a conclusion that the moment was at hand to demonstrate his good intentions to Mrs. Thatcher, and to become better acquainted with her daughter,--all in a single operation. "If my leaving the table won't disturb your reflections--" he began. Cosden looked up quickly and smiled. "I didn't intend to be such poor company, Monty," he apologized. "The fact is, I have a good deal on my mind. Of course you can't understand what that means; all you have to do is to eat three meals a day, stand still while Dixon dolls you up at stated intervals and go to sleep at night after he tucks you away in your little trundle-bed."