"Mr. Armstrong who bought Patergrey's patent?" cried Rob. "The very same. He has never forgotten your describing it to him in his office, so frightened, yet so brave," said Mr. Baldwin. "He heard of this entertainment, and came out for your sake." "What a lovely world this is!" laughed Rob. "I'll go find him." And she moved off in search of her elderly acquaintance, looking back to see Mr. Baldwin taking up to radiant Prue a young man whose face was turned from her, but whose "back looked well-bred" Rob thought. Her progress towards Mr. Armstrong was impeded by congratulations, but at last Rob reached him. "I am glad to see that you have not forgotten me," said the old gentleman, grasping the hand she extended. "I am not likely ever to forget you," returned Rob simply. "No, it is not likely; our acquaintance was brief, but impressive to us both," said Mr. Armstrong. "You will be glad to learn that your father's invention has proved valuable to us, Miss Grey. Are you Miss Grey?" "Not yet," said Rob with her whimsical twist of the lips as she smiled up into the kindly face. "It is delightful to know that my dear father's work was all he believed it to be." "Fully," assented the old gentleman. "But Miss Roberta, what about the child that sang here to-night? They tell me she is a protégé of yours. She is a prodigy. I want to know about her. I am not going back to town to-night; I have no fancy for these late, crawling trains back from suburban pleasures. I am staying over night at your Fayre hotel--why do you have a town with a name so provocative of puns? May I call on you to-morrow? Not only to tell you what real pleasure you young people gave me to-night, but to hear about this child?" "We should all be glad, indeed, to see you, Mr. Armstrong, with no errand whatever," said Rob. "I'll tell you all there is to learn of Polly. I suppose I shouldn't stop now; there are so many people to whom I ought to speak." "Run along, run along, lovely little green great-grandmother," said Mr. Armstrong, with an appreciative downward glance at Rob's beautiful costume. The rooms were rapidly thinning out as she turned away from the old gentleman; Frances was beckoning her. Rob crossed over to her. "Mother has a spread for us, the thirty-five performers, in the dining-room--she is the dearest thing! We are going to have a glorious time, so hurry up and do the pretty-behaved to those who bought your tickets, and then come to the banquet." Rob needed no further hint. The eight heroines of the gavotte sipped the sweets of adulation for a short time, completely overshadowing their less brilliant but equally meritorious partners, till the last of their audience had departed. "Come ghosts of departed years; come ancestral descendants; come and see if modern viands have a pleasant flavour," cried Mrs. Silsby from the doorway, and the picture-figures, seizing their proper partners' arms, burst into the song of the gavotte and to it marched to supper.