It was in February that their father suggested that they should return the numerous hospitalities offered them by giving a dance. It would not be a ball. They were still too inexperienced in the art of entertainment, and their mourning was yet too deep to permit of their venturing on so ambitious a beginning. “Just a house-warming,” Allen said when he saw that they were rather alarmed by the magnitude of the undertaking. There was much talking and consulting of the Colonel. Every night after dinner the girls sat long over the coffee and fruit, discussing such vital points as to whether there should be two salads at the supper and would they have four musicians or five. Allen called them “little misers,” and told them they “never would be tracked through life by the quarters they dropped.” It was interesting to the Colonel to notice that Rosamund’s habits of economy clung to her, while June had assimilated the tastes and extravagances of the women about her with a sudden, transforming completeness. It was at one of these after-dinner consultations that he was presented with the list of guests written out neatly in Rosamund’s clear hand. Was it all right, or did Uncle Jim think they had left out anybody? As he ran his eye over it Allen said suddenly: “They’ve got Mrs. Newbury down there. What do you think about her?” The Colonel, who was reading through his glasses, looked up with a sharp glance of surprise and again down at the list, where his eyes stopped at the questioned name. “Oh, strike her off,” he said. “What do you want her for?” “She’s been here to see us,” Rosamund demurred, “and she asked us once to her house to hear somebody sing.” “Why shouldn’t she come?” said June. “What is there about her you don’t like?” “I didn’t say there was anything,” he answered in a tone of irritated impatience. “But she’s a good deal older than you, and--and--well, I guess it wouldn’t amuse her. She doesn’t dance. You don’t want to waste any invitations on people who may not come.” Apparently this piece of masculine logic was to him conclusive, for he took his pencil and made a mark through the name. The evening of the dance arrived, and long before midnight its success was assured. It was undoubtedly one of the most brilliant affairs of the winter. It seemed the last touch on the ascending fortunes of June and Rosamund. They had never looked so well. In her dress of shimmering white, which showed her polished shoulders, Rosamund was beautiful, and June, similarly garbed, looked, as some of the women guests remarked, “actually pretty.” As a hostess she danced little. Three times, however, Rosamund noticed her floating about the room encircled by the arm of Jerry Barclay. Other people noticed it too. But June, carried away by the excitement of the evening, was indifferent to the comment she might create. So was Barclay. He had drunk much champagne and felt defiant of the world. She felt defiant too, because she was so confidently happy.