Fox hesitated how to reply; he was by no means a prudent man, but he was instinctively aware of the dangers of her mood, and he had swiftly entertained and rejected two or three answers which would have led them into yet deeper intricacies, when they were happily interrupted by the approach of the French ambassador, a gentleman who united with great astuteness and diplomatic suavity a strong resemblance to an intelligent and bewhiskered French poodle. “We have heard so much of those dancing steps, Mrs. White; when shall we have the pleasure of seeing them?” he asked, smilingly courteous and attentive. “Oh, now!--on the instant,” Margaret retorted, her mood changing like a flash and her eyes sparkling a gay defiance; “there’s no time like the present. William, are the musicians there?” Fox looked across at the palm-screened alcove, and catching a glimpse of a violin, assented. She clapped her hands. “Tell them to play me the Spanish piece which they played on Tuesday,” she commanded. At the first note there was a general cessation of conversation, and every eye turned quickly toward her. She stood in the centre of the room, her slender arms raised and her hands clasped behind her head, a dreamy expression on her half lifted face, the shadowy masses of her pale brown hair framing a white brow. Her eyes drooped, her whole aspect seemed to change, like the chameleon’s, to become an embodiment of the dreamily seductive strains which floated softly into space, then, as the music quickened and developed, she began to sway slightly, dancing down the long room alone, her clinging, shimmering skirts trailing around her feet, flowing in and out, but never seeming to arrest the wonderful rhythmic swing of her movements. With her, dancing was an interpretation of music, an expression of some subtle mystery of her nature, the very personification of an enchanting grace. There was an almost breathless attention on the part of her guests, and no one was conscious of the displeasure on White’s full flushed face. No one but his wife; as she danced to and fro, weaving in the fantasy of strange figures, her eyes rested occasionally on him, and the mockery of her glance was a revelation to those who could read it. It was but little observed, however, nor was she understood when, at last, with a sudden swift movement she caught up her filmy draperies, displaying two slender ankles and a pair of wonderfully shod feet, as she executed a deliberate fandango which not a little amazed the more sedate of her guests. In answer, perhaps, to some secret signal of White’s, the music stopped abruptly and with it Margaret’s astonishing performance. Quite unmoved, and ignoring the interruption, or rather treating it as the natural termination of her dance, she turned with a graceful swirl of gleaming silks and received the rather effusive applause of her guests with heightened color and flashing eyes.