Sard, utterly generous, utterly untainted of mind, could hardly take this fellow in. She leaned forward anxiously. "You mean," she said gravely, "oh, what are you trying to say?" Young Troop had risen; something craven in him made him aware that it might not be best to stay and face such real emotion. Anger in Sard might be a difficult thing to laugh off. He admired her while he feared her. Now a breezy, heated throng spilled out of the long doors onto the piazza; the girls perched upon the rails and let the river breeze cool their hot faces, while the boys leaned against pillars, hands in pockets, getting off the time-honored persiflage of the young dancing swain. Tawny saw Gertrude, in black net, still entwined by the golden serpents and with a green jade circlet round her dark hair. The great dramatic eyes summoned him. "Thanks, awfully much," he drawled in the silly parlance of the "star" dancer. "I'll say I enjoyed it; that was some little fox trot, what?" Tawny was edging away when Sard Bogart, with a curious gesture of command, stopped him. "You mustn't think you--you can go on with this sort of thing," the girl said in a low voice. "That inference of yours stops right here; no matter what there is between you and Minga--you--you can't go on saying things." The now rather dismayed Tawny found himself once more against the Bogart directness, and squirmed uncomfortably. "Oh, forget it--I've 'destroyed the papers,'" he quoted with dramatic raillery. "Minga won't get shown up by me." Again Gertrude looking over her partner's shoulder summoned him. "Say, but isn't Gert a looker?" breathed Tawny. "I guess she wants to be rushed next dance, things getting a little slow for Gert; I promised to look up a new crowd of cut-ins for her; well, so long!" Tawny bowed with a curious half cross-eyed look of sneaking amusement. His eyes were smouldering with a caddish kind of excitement; he could afford to be good humored. "Say, I'll cut it out," he pledged. "I'll drop the story; I can't speak for the girls, Cinny and Gert and all, they've been having a lot of fun with Minga in the dressing-room; she took a good deal of guying, they say. Of course," advised Tawny patronizingly, "you ought to let her know it has made a difference in her popularity." Just then Dunstan came up. He shoved past Troop, ignoring him while he elbowed him. "Sard," he said clearly, "I must ask you to stop talking to this--er--cad. He has been discussing a friend of yours, our friend,--well, I think we don't need him in our vicinity." "Your friend will need you both all right," muttered Tawny vindictively; "she'll need you both for dance partners and--and everything else!" As the groups on the piazza filtered back to the ballroom, Sard seized her brother's coat sleeve. "Go and get Minga quickly," she said, "and Mr. Shipman if you can. Oh, quick, before she realizes."