“Oh yes—­Westover.  Thought we left Westover at Mrs. Enderby’s.  Thought it was that jay—­What’s his name?  Durgin.  He’s awful jay, but civil to me, and I want be civil to him.  You’re not—­jay?  No?  That’s right.  Fellow made me sick; but I took his champagne; and I must show him some—­attention.”  He released the door-handle, and fell back against the cushioned carriage wall.  “He’s a blackguard!” he said, sourly.  “Not—­simple jay-blackguard, too.  No—­no—­business bring in my sister’s name, hey?  You—­you say it’s—­Westover?  Oh yes, Westover.  Old friend of family.  Tell you good joke, Westover—­my sister’s.  No more jays for me, no more jags for you.  That’s what she say—­just between her and me, you know; she’s a lady, Bess is; knows when to use—­slang.  Mark—­mark of a lady know when to use slang.  Pretty good—­jays and jags.  Guess we didn’t count this time—­either of us.”

When the carriage pulled up before Miss Lynde’s house, Westover opened the door.  “You’re at home, now, Lynde.  Come, let’s get out.”

Lynde did not stir.  He asked Westover again who he was, and when he had made sure of him, he said, with dignity, Very well; now they must get the other fellow.  Westover entreated; he even reasoned; Lynde lay back in the corner of the carriage, and seemed asleep.

Westover thought of pulling him up and getting him indoors by main force.  He appealed to the coachman to know if they could not do it together.

“Why, you see, I couldn’t leave me harsses, sor,” said the coachman.  “What’s he wants, sor?” He bent urbanely down from his box and listened to the explanation that Westover made him, standing in the cold on the curbstone, with one hand on the carriage door.  “Then it’s no use, sor,” the man decided.  “Whin he’s that way, ahl hell couldn’t stir um.  Best go back, sor, and try to find the gentleman.”

This was in the end what Westover had to do, feeling all the time that a thing so frantically absurd could not be a waking act, but helpless to escape from its performance.  He thought of abandoning his charge and leaving him, to his fate when he opened the carriage door before Mrs. Enderby’s house; but with the next thought he perceived that this was on all accounts impossible.  He went in, and began his quest for Jeff, sending various serving men about with vague descriptions of him, and asking for him of departing guests, mostly young men he did not know, but who, he thought, might know Jeff.

He had to take off his overcoat at last, and reappear at the ball.  The crowd was still great, but visibly less dense than it had been.  By a sudden inspiration he made his way to the supper-room, and he found Jeff there, filling a plate, as if he were about to carry it off somewhere.  He commanded Jeff’s instant presence in the carriage outside; he told him of Alan’s desire for him.

Jeff leaned back against the wall with the plate in his hand and laughed till it half slipped from his hold.  When he could get his breath, he said:  “I’ll be back in a few minutes; I’ve got to take this to Miss Bessie Lynde.  But I’ll be right back.”