He said to a girl, behind whose chair he was standing: "All the younger
brothers and sisters are coming here to confound me; I hear a Miss Innis
announced, but it turns out to be her younger sister--"

"By the way, do you know my name?" she asked.

"No," he said frankly, "do you know mine?"

"Of course, I do; I listened breathlessly when somebody presented you
wholesale at your sister's the other day. I'm Rosamund Fane. You might
as well be instructed because you're to take me in at the Orchils' next
Thursday night, I believe."

"Rosamund Fane," he repeated coolly. "I wonder how we've avoided each
other so consistently this winter? I never before had a good view of
you, though I heard you talking to young Innis at dinner. And yet," he
added, smiling, "if I had been instructed to look around and select
somebody named Rosamund, I certainly should have decided on you."

"A compliment?" she asked, raising her delicate eyebrows.

"Ask yourself," he said.

"I do; and I get snubbed."

And, smiling still, he said: "Do you know the most mischievous air that
Schubert ever worried us with?"

"'Rosamund,'" she said; "and--thank you, Captain Selwyn." She had
coloured to the hair.