'
'Then you never called upon us?'
'I blush to confess it, never; but I will call, in future, every day.'
'Your ingenuousness really rivals your modesty.'
'Now, after these confessions and compliments, may I suggest a waltz?'
'No one is waltzing now.'
'When the quadrille, then, is finished?'
'Then I am engaged.'
'After your engagement?'
'That is indeed making a business of pleasure. I have just refused
a similar request of your fellow-steward. We damsels shall soon be
obliged to carry a book to enrol our engagements as well as our bets, if
this system of reversionary dancing be any longer encouraged.'
'But you must dance with me!' said the Duke, imploringly.
'Oh! you will stumble upon me in the course of the evening, and I shall
probably be more fortunate.
I suppose you feel nervous about to-morrow?'
'Not at all.'
'Ah! I forgot. Your Grace's horse is the favourite. Favourites always
win.'
'Have I a horse?'
'Why, Lord St. Jerome says he doubts whether it be one.'
'Lord St. Jerome seems a vastly amusing personage; and, as he is so
often taken for an ostler, I have no doubt is an exceedingly good judge
of horse-flesh.
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