Some one said, "There is no punishment equal to a granted prayer." Du
Meresq was wrapt in speculation as to whether they had really succeeded
in getting a wild turkey for supper, which the Mess President was in
maddening doubt about the day before.

That blissful moment was at hand, and the room thinned with a celerity
born of _ennui_, I suppose, for very few people are really hungry, yet it
is the invariable signal for as simultaneous a rush as of starving
paupers when the door of a soup kitchen is opened. To be sure, there are
the chaperones, poor things, round whom no "lovers are sighing," and,
perhaps, supper _is_ the liveliest time to them--old gentlemen, too,
might be allowed some indulgence; but what can be said for dancing men,
wasting the precious moments of their partners, while they linger
congregated together among the _débris_ and champagne-corks?

"What a clearance," said Bluebell, subsiding, with a fagged air, on to a
sofa, as her partner bowed himself off with an eye to business.

"Forward the heavy brigade," said Bertie, motioning to his brother-in-law
bearing off Lady Hampshire; "only room for thirty at a time. _We_ must
wait, Miss Leigh."

"I am ready to wait. But what have 'we' got to say to it?" said Bluebell,
with her Canadian directness.

"Don't speak so unkindly," said Bertie, sentimentally, flinging himself
on the sofa by her side. "You don't know all I have suffered this week."

"You certainly disguised it very well," said the girl, with total