It would be
sport-royal while it lasted. What a tale to give out at the club of a
Sunday night! I chuckled on the way to the ball-room: I had dispensed
with going up to the dressing-room. My robe was a genuine one, heavy
and warm; so I had no overcoat to check.
"Grave monk, your blessing!"
Turning, I beheld an exquisite Columbine.
[Illustration: Turning, I beheld an exquisite Columbine.]
"_Pax vobiscum_!" I replied solemnly.
"_Pax_ . . . What does that mean?"
"It means, do not believe all you see in the newspapers."
Columbine laughed gaily. "I did not know that you were a Latin
scholar; and besides, you gave me to understand you were coming as a
Jesuit, Billy."
Billy? Here was one who thought she knew me. I hastened to
disillusion her.
"My dear Columbine, you do not know me, not the least bit. My name is
not Billy, it is Dicky."
"Oh, you can not fool me," she returned. "I heard you call out to
Teddy Hamilton that your card was the ten of hearts; and you wrote me,
saying that would be your card."
Complications already, and I hadn't yet put a foot inside the ball-room!
"I am sorry," I said, "but you have made a mistake. Your Jesuit
probably told you his card would be the nine, not the ten.
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