doesn't matter, I shall know you again"; and she had the audacity
to write on her program, for I saw her do it, "white dress, red
hair."

She was borne off by a triumphant boy, who looked at me as much as
to say, "You're jolly well sold if you think you are going to nab
this dance."

I asked a hungry-looking boy with many freckles who she was. "Oh!
that's Dolly," he said; "she is a flyer, isn't she?"

"Dolly who?" I asked.

"Oh! just Dolly; that does." He looked away, looked back,
hesitated, and swallowed. I, feeling that he perhaps needed the
assistance a man sometimes requires of a woman, encouragement,
smiled at him.

"You wouldn't dance this, I suppose?" he said.

"Certainly," I answered.

We danced. He was a nice boy, very much in earnest, very much
afraid of tiring me, very much afraid of letting me go, too shy to
stop, until I suggested it, for which act of consideration he
seemed grateful.

He told me he had five brothers, all older than himself; that he
never had new trousers, always the other boys' cut down; that he
liked school; wanted a bicycle more than anything in the world --