"It is a common oath men use--not gentlewomen," I said.

"Oh! I supposed it harmless. They all laugh when I say it--father and
Guy Johnson and the rest; and they swear other oaths--words I would not
say if I could--but I did not know there was harm in a good
smart 'damn!'"

She leaned back, one slender hand playing with the stem of her glass;
and the flush faded from her face like an afterglow from a
serene horizon.

"I fear," she said, "you of the South wear a polish we lack."

"Best mirror your faults in it while you have the chance," said Harry,
promptly.

"We lack polish--even Walter Butler and Guy Johnson sneer at us under
father's nose," said Ruyven. "What the devil is it in us Varicks that
set folk whispering and snickering and nudging one another? Am I
parti-colored, like an Oneida at a scalp-dance? Does Harry wear bat's
wings for ears? Are Dorothy's legs crooked, that they all stare?"

"It's your red head," observed Cecile. "The good folk think to see the
noon-sun setting in the wood--"

"Oh, tally! you always say that," snapped Ruyven.

Dorothy, leaning forward, looked at me with dreamy blue eyes that saw
beyond me.