hands and neck as he never dared when he was in momentary dread of the eyes
being turned upon him.

She was dressed in black, which seemed to take her yet further from the
white-clad, gewgawed women about her; and the little hands were white, and
the diamond ring glittered. Where had she got that ring? He bent forward
a little and tried to decipher the letters, but the candle-light was too
faint. When he looked up her eyes were fixed on him. She was looking at
him--not, Gregory felt, as she had ever looked at him before; not as though
he were a stump or a stone that chance had thrown in her way. Tonight,
whether it were critically, or kindly, or unkindly, he could not tell, but
she looked at him, at the man, Gregory Rose, with attention. A vague
elation filled him. He clinched his fist tight to think of some good idea
he might express to her; but of all those profound things he had pictured
himself as saying to her, when he sat alone in the daub-and-wattle house,
not one came. He said, at last:

"These Boer dances are very low things;" and then, as soon as it had gone
from him, he thought it was not a clever remark, and wished it back.

Before Lyndall replied Em looked in at the door.

"Oh, come," she said; "they are going to have the cushion-dance. I do not
want to kiss any of these fellows. Take me quickly."

She slipped her hand into Gregory's arm.

"It is so dusty, Em; do you care to dance any more?" he asked, without
rising.