“What are you doing?  Where are you staying?  How long are you going to be in town?” demanded Mrs. Lancaster, turning to Keith.

“Mining.—­At the Brunswick.—­Only a day or two,” said Keith, laughing.

“Mining?  Gold-mining?”

“No; not yet.”

“Where?”

“Down South at a place called New Leeds.  It’s near the place where I used to teach.  It’s a great city.  Why, we think New York is jealous of us.”

“Oh, I know about that.  A friend of mine put a little money down there for me.  You know him?  Ferdy Wickersham?”

“Yes, I know him.”

“Most of us know him,” observed Mr. Stirling, turning his eyes on Keith.

“Of course, you must know him.  Are you in with him?  He tells me that they own pretty much everything that is good in that region.  They are about to open a new mine that is to exceed anything ever known.  Ferdy tells me I am good for I don’t know how much.  The stock is to be put on the exchange in a little while, and I got in on the ground-floor.  That’s what they call it—­the lowest floor of all, you know.

“Yes; some people call it the ground-floor,” said Keith, wishing to change the subject.

“You know there may be a cellar under a ground-floor,” observed Mr. Stirling, demurely.

Keith looked at him, and their eyes met.

Fortunately, perhaps, for Keith, some one came up just then and claimed a dance with Mrs. Lancaster.  She moved away, and then turned back.

“I shall see you again?”

“Yes.  Why, I hope so-certainly.”

She stopped and looked at him.

“When are you going away?”

“Why, I don’t exactly know.  Very soon.  Perhaps, in a day or two.”

“Well, won’t you come to see us?  Here, I will give you my address.  Have you a card?” She took the pencil he offered her and wrote her number on it.  “Come some afternoon—­about six; Mr. Lancaster is always in then,” she said sedately.  “I am sure you will like each other.”  Keith bowed.

She floated off smiling.  What she had said to Mrs. Wentworth occurred to her.

“Yes; he looks like a man.”  She became conscious that her companion was asking a question.

“What is the matter with you?” he said.  “I have asked you three times who that man was, and you have not said a word.”

“Oh, I beg your pardon.  Mr. Keith, an old friend of mine,” she said, and changed the subject.

As to her old friend, he was watching her as she danced, winding in and out among the intervening couples.  He wondered that he could ever have thought that a creature like that could care for him and share his hard life.  He might as soon have expected a bird-of-paradise to live by choice in a coal-bunker.

He strolled about, looking at the handsome women, and presently found himself in the conservatory.  Turning a clump, of palms, he came on Mrs. Wentworth and Mr. Wickersham sitting together talking earnestly.  Keith was about to go up and speak to Mrs. Wentworth, but her escort said something under his breath to her, and she looked away.  So Keith passed on.