Beatrice
proposed to him. It was at the Roberson dinner-dance, in the Palm
Room, within sight but not within hearing of a dozen other guests.
She camouflaged what she was doing with occasional smiles and ripples
of laughter intended to deceive the others present, but her heart was
pounding sixty miles an hour.
Bromfield was not easily disconcerted. He prided himself on his
aplomb. It was hard to get behind his cynical, decorous smile, the
mask of a suave and worldly-wise Pharisee of the twentieth century.
But for once he was amazed. The orchestra was playing a lively fox
trot and he thought that perhaps he had not caught her meaning.
"I beg your pardon."
Miss Whitford laced her fingers round her knee and repeated. It was as
though rose leaves had brushed the ivory of her cheeks and left a
lovely stain there. Her eyes were hard and brilliant as diamonds.
"I was wondering when you are going to ask me again to marry you."
Since she had given a good deal of feminine diplomacy to the task of
keeping him at a reasonable distance, Bromfield was naturally surprised.
"That's certainly a leading question," he parried, "What are you up to,
Bee? Are you spoofing me?"
"I'm proposing to you," she explained, with a flirt of her hand and an
engaging smile toward a man and a girl who had just come into the Palm
Room. "I don't suppose I do it very well because I haven't had your
experience. But I'm doing the best I can."
The New Yorker was a supple diplomatist.
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