It was not a waltz it was an Ecstasy.
Starting almost alone, this peerless pair danced a gauntlet. On each side
admiration and detraction buzzed all the time.
"Beautiful! They are turning in the air."
"Quite gone by. That's how the old fogies dance."
Chorus of shallow males: "How well she waltzes."
Chorus of shallow females: "How well he waltzes."
But they noted neither praise nor detraction: they saw nothing, heard
nothing, felt nothing, but themselves and the other music, till two
valsers _a deux temps_ plunged into them. Thus smartly reminded they had
not earth all to themselves, they laughed good-humouredly and paused.
"Ah! I am happy!" gushed from Julia. She hushed at herself, and said
severely, "You dance very well, sir." This was said to justify her
unguarded admission, and did, after a fashion. "I think it is time to go
to mamma," said she demurely.
"So soon? And I had so much to say to you."
"Oh, very well. I am all attention."
The sudden facility offered set Alfred stammering a little. "I wanted to
apologise to you for something--you are so good you seem to have
forgotten it--but I dare not hope that--I mean at Henley--when the beauty
of your character, and your goodness, so overpowered me, that a fatal
impulse----"
"What do you mean, sir?" said Julia, looking him full in the face, like
an offended lion, while, with true feminine and Julian inconsistency her
bosom fluttered like a dove.
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