uld be begun. Denry learned this as soon as he emerged, effulgent, from the gentlemen's cloak-room into the broad red-carpeted corridor which runs from end to end of the ground-floor of the Town Hal

mparable flannel-washer; but universal white kid gloves constitute a democracy, an

of the Sweetnam boy

" said Denry with

t time, and it is not paid for, either." But it was not so. And the reason was that the entire population of the Town Hall was heartily engaged in pretending that never in its life had it been seen after seven o'clock of a night apart from a dress-suit. Denry observe

ooned with flowers. The thrill of being magnificent seized him, and he was drenched in a vast desire to be truly magnificent himself. He dreamt of magnificence, boot-brushes kept sticking out of this dream like black mud out of snow. In his reverie he loo

orridor, and the sublimes

fraid of her, as though she was recovering from influenza and they feared to catch it. She had precisely the same high voice, and precisely the same efficient smile as she had employed to Denry, and these instruments worked marvels on Aldermen; they were as melting as salt on snow. The Countess disappeared up-stairs in a cloud of shrill apologies and trailing A

Jock!"

!" said the o

pening?" Denry e

ut the antics of one o

n white. Except that nothing glittered in her hair, she looked the very eq

waltz?" Denry b

with chilliness. "I suppose you 've been st

he said. "I did n't

n't you look at

t one," he s

take a programme

, cuttingly, somewhat in h

he waltz?" he sugg

continued her soli

uation, and equal to the style of his suit. But he could not. In a moment he

wicked crime for her, she could ne

ight and by name for a dance. (Ruth had taught him how to ask.) Not one of them had a dance left. Several looked at

e wealthiest manufacturer of his years (barely twenty-four) in the Five Towns. Also Sillitoe,

y Aldermen. Possibly she was getting her breath; possibly nobody had had the pluck to ask her. Anyhow she seemed to be stranded there, on a beach of Aldermen. Very wisely she had brought with her no members

st out. He had hitherto said nothing in the group, an

it. It's a free cou

for two pins!

entful of his presence there. Harold Etches

ver you don't," sai

Denry very quickly, and