CHAPTER XXVIII Sitting It Out SKIPPY, fatuously unconscious of any overtaking fate, escorted Dolly to the next Saturday night hop. On Monday Mr. Hickey Hicks would be on his way to new pastures and life would return to simpler terms. Dolly, however, was in no amiable frame of mind.

"You said he had a glass eye. You know you did," she said for the tenth time.

"Now that's just like a woman," thought Skippy, justly offended, and out loud he said, with some asperity, "You said so. I never did."

"I?"

"Sure, you did! Why you said it was the left one."

"Well, you let me think so anyway."

"How was I to know?" said Skippy, illogically. "Perhaps he has a glass eye. Have you asked him?"

They reached the club house and as the orchestra was already industriously at work, Skippy said playfully,

"All's fair in love and war anyhow! S'pose we dance."

"You don't deserve it," said Dolly, hesitating. She glanced around and as no one else was an immediate prospect, she accorded him her arm. Skippy began to perceive that the burden of conversation would lie with him.

The next dance was a waltz and they waited, the one expectantly, the other in resignation for the usual rush of the stags which invariably accompanied Miss Dolly's conquering arrival. As she was endowed with a lively sense of humor, her irritation had quite departed and Skippy was as blissfully happy in his restoration to favor as the four-footed puppy when reconciliation with the master has followed chastisement. To keep fidelity with human nature, it must likewise be recorded that the practical sense was likewise strong in the young lady, who was fully aware of the value of a bird in the hand to one about to fly the bush. Hickey appeared and came directly towards them. Skippy fell back.

"Hello, Skippy, old top," said Hickey, with accented cordiality. He shook hands with Miss Dolly, who greeted him with the most encouraging of smiles. He complimented her on the bewitching gown which made her prettier than ever, wondered where she had been all this time, shook hands effusively—and passed on. Miss Dolly bit her lip and took hasty survey of the room. The old reliables were all actively engaged, spinning about the room with other partners.

"Oh, I adore this tune," she said suddenly. "Come on, let's waltz."

Then, just to show her independence, she suggested that the next dance, a polka, was a dreadful bore and Skippy, still unsuspicious, bore her away in great delight to the shadowy intimacies of the veranda. Miss Dolly was a little quicker in her perceptions. She saw what was up, and being of high spirit, decided to answer in kind. She returned to the floor and danced a third time with Skippy, who was too fatuously pleased with his good fortune to notice the suppressed hilarity in the room.

"Let's sit here," said Dolly, selecting the most public spot. When Happy Mather and Crocker and Lazelle and the superior Mr. Hicks did arrive, she would have her revenge. She would refuse flatly. She would dance with Skippy openly and defiantly the whole evening. The only drawback was that no one came.

They sat out two dances and then a feeling of panic descended upon them. They were horribly, glaringly conspicuous. Every eye was on them. Every one was whispering at their expense. Dolly had never known the sensation of being a wallflower, and for the first time her natural wit deserted her. At first she had deployed all the instinctive arts of her challenged coquetry. She had openly flaunted her affection for Skippy, smiling into his fascinated eyes, laughing uproariously at the inanities he had to offer. Then her spirits suddenly evaporated and she listened with a cold creepy feeling in her back, while Skippy, in desperation for a topic of conversation, began to explain the intricacies of Mosquito-Proof Socks, to perfecting which his life henceforth would be devoted.

"Let's dance."

Skippy, halfway in his exposition of the commercial value of an invention which would appeal to twice ninety million legs at six pair of socks a year, flushed and rose heavily. The light had dawned upon him at last. They were being put in coventry and the diabolical mind that was thus taking its fiendish revenge could be none other than the man he had wronged—Hickey Hicks.

From now on it was torture, pure, unadulterated, exquisite torture, such as only the self-conscious stripling of the first sixteen awkward years can experience. To save his life he could not think of a thing to say, while in his arms Dolly grew heavier and heavier. His arm ached, his feet began to stumble, he bumped into other couples.

After he had sat out the eighth dance in fitful silence, he began to experience the strangest antipathy for Miss Dolly Travers, who but an hour before had been the rapturous ending of all his day dreams. Let no cynic here exclaim, with facile wit, that romance ends thus in the compulsory quality of marriage. We make no such allusions. We only state that Skippy, in his inexperience, began morally to disintegrate. The more he was forced to sit, chained by convention, the object of public hilarity, the more he wondered at his former infatuation. Dolly disputed by every male was a figment of the imagination—how different was the reality! Mimi Lafontaine was a hundred times more desirable and at least had something to say! The situation was hideous, but how escape? If only he could get to Hickey and buy him off! But he couldn't get to his tormentor, that was the trouble! Then suddenly an idea came to him. In his pocket was the roll of bills that comprised the sinking fund for his dress suit. Carefully and unnoticed by Dolly, he extracted a two dollar bill. When next he danced, he danced with the bill openly flaunted behind the all-unconscious Dolly, openly offering it to whoever would come to his rescue. Still the banded traitors smirked and remained loyal to their leader—they, too, had scores to settle!

"Get me a glass of lemonade, won't you, Jack, like a dear?" said Dolly, who had thought of a possible opening.

Skippy went and took a full five minutes until he had made quite sure the next dance was under way. To his horror Dolly was where he had left her—sitting alone.

When the tenth dance had begun, he hesitated no longer. He replaced the two dollar bill by one of the next denomination, and with the V carefully exposed, he managed to bump into Hickey and draw his attention to the price of his liberty. Hickey appeared interested but only half convinced. Skippy held out another dance and then, groaning inwardly, increased the bait to ten.

Whereupon Hickey condescended. The signal was given and Skippy, standing aloof and humble in the shadows of the veranda, perceived through the window Miss Dolly Travers, as the stags swarmed down, resume her sway as the queen of the ball.

On Monday Hickey departed in a burst of glory. With him something else departed—a great romance. Illusions are fragile things and when they are shattered the pieces are too small to be reassembled. Sic transit Dolly Travers!

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