“Aye, but let us hasten to find our hostess.  They will be forming for the minuet directly, and you must dance it with me, sweet wife,—­unless you prefer another partner.”

Clarissa’s response to this lover-like speech was evidently satisfactory, for presently Betty beheld her sister and Gulian take places at the head of the room, next Madam De Lancey, who opened her ball with Sir Henry Clinton.  Betty, since her arrival in New York, had been trained and tutored for the minuet by both Clarissa and Kitty, and here was Captain Sir John Faulkner, an elderly but gallant beau, supplicating for the honor of her hand in the opening dance.

“I am loth to decline,” began Betty, a little overpowered by the compliment, “but I have already promised this dance.”

“To me,” said Geoffrey Yorke, at her side, and looking up, Betty, for the first time, saw her lover in all the bravery of full uniform, powdered hair, and costly laces.  If he had been strikingly handsome in the old homespun clothes in which he first appeared before her on the shores of Great Pond, he was ten times more so now.  Betty forgot that his coat was scarlet, that he represented an odious king and all she had been taught to despise; she only saw the gallant manly form and loving eyes which met hers so frankly, and the hand she gave him trembled as he led her out upon the floor.  For Betty did not know—­though the realization came to her later, with bitter tears—­ that all unconsciously she had entered that fabled kingdom, the knowledge of which makes life a mystery, death a glory!

The music swelled on in slow and stately measure; jewels flashed in the blaze of wax candles, silken brocades rustled a soft accompaniment to the steps and courtesies of their fair wearers, as Betty dreamed her dream of happiness, only half aware that she was dreaming.  And when, at the close of the minuet, Geoffrey led her to Clarissa, there was no lack of gallants nor partners, and Peter would have chuckled with delight could he have seen that no one was so eagerly sought for as the lovely, roguish maid, who wore the knots of rose-colored ribbon.

It was time for supper, and instruments were being tuned into order for a grand march, to be led by Madam De Lancey, when Betty, standing near a large Indian screen, talking with Mr. Van Brugh, who was a dear friend of her father’s, became aware of subdued voices at her elbow, on the other side of the screen.

[Illustration:  The minuet]

“I tell you I am right,” said one of these testily; “I would stake my sword that he is not what he seems.  I saw him exchange a bit of paper with yonder manikin fiddler, who has been under suspicion for some weeks, and cleverly they did it, too.  It’s not the first time, I’ll warrant, that Mynheer von Gam—­”

“No, no, not Von at all; you are safe to be mistaken, Colonel Tarleton; the gentleman is one Diedrich Gansevoort from the Albany beverwyck.  Madam De Lancey herself made us acquainted; he is no spy.”