meant to insinuate what knowing people called a "double
entendre."

"Well--it's queer to have brought Miss Welland,
anyhow," some one said in a low tone, with a side-
glance at Archer.

"Oh, that's part of the campaign: Granny's orders,
no doubt," Lefferts laughed. "When the old lady does
a thing she does it thoroughly."

The act was ending, and there was a general stir in
the box. Suddenly Newland Archer felt himself
impelled to decisive action. The desire to be the first man
to enter Mrs. Mingott's box, to proclaim to the waiting
world his engagement to May Welland, and to see her
through whatever difficulties her cousin's anomalous
situation might involve her in; this impulse had abruptly
overruled all scruples and hesitations, and sent him
hurrying through the red corridors to the farther side
of the house.

As he entered the box his eyes met Miss Welland's,
and he saw that she had instantly understood his motive,
though the family dignity which both considered
so high a virtue would not permit her to tell him so.
The persons of their world lived in an atmosphere of
faint implications and pale delicacies, and the fact that
he and she understood each other without a word
seemed to the young man to bring them nearer than