"Your Valenciennes lace excruciates the Ryders," said Helen. "I was standing near Mrs. Judge Ryder and the girls just now. 'Did you ever see such an upstart?' And, 'What an extravagant dress she has on--it is ridiculous,' Josephine Ryder said. When Ben Somers heard this attack on you, he told them that your lace was an heirloom. Here he is." Mr. Parker took her away, and Ben Somers went in pursuit of a seat. The quadrille was over, I was engaged for the next, and he had not come back. I saw nothing of him till the country dance before supper. He was at the foot of the long line, opposite a pretty girl in blue, looking very solemn and stately. I took off the glove from my hand which wore the new diamond, and held it up, expecting him to look my way soon. Its flash caught his eyes, as they roamed up and down, and, as I expected, he left his place and came up behind me. "Where did you get that ring?" wiping his face with his handkerchief. "Ask Alice." "You are politic." "Handsome, isn't it?" "And valuable; it cost as much as the new horse." "Have you made a memorandum of it?" "Destiny has brilliant spokes in her wheel, hasn't she?" "Is that from the Greek tragedies?" "To your places, gentlemen," the floor-manager called, and the band struck up the Fisher's Hornpipe. At supper, I saw Ben Somers, still with the pretty girl in blue; but he came to my chair and asked me if I did not think she was a pretty toy for a man to play with. "How much wine have you drunk? Enough to do justice to the family annals?" "Really, you have been well informed. No, I have _not_ drunk enough for that; but Mrs. Ryder has sent her virgins home with me. I am afraid their lamps are upset again. I drink nothing after to-night. You shall not ask again, 'How much?'" My fire was out when I reached home. My head was burning and aching. I was too tired to untwist my hair, and I pulled and dragged at my dress, which seemed to have a hundred fastenings. Creeping into bed, I perceived the odor of flowers, and looking at my table discovered a bunch of white roses. "Roses are nonsense, and life is nonsense," I thought. When I opened my eyes, Alice was standing by the bed, with a glass of roses in her hand. "Charles put these roses here, hey?" "I suppose so; throw them out of the window, and me too; my head is splitting." "To make amends for not giving you any last night," she went on; "he is quite childish." "Can't you unbraid my hair, it hurts my head so?" She felt my hands. I was in a fever, she said, and ran down for Charles. "Cass is sick, in spite of your white roses." "The devil take the roses. Can't you get up, Cassandra?" "Not now. Go away, will you?"