The shock of the fall stupefied her for a moment.  She lay against his breast like a terrified child, clinging to him convulsively.

“It’s all right,” he murmured soothingly.  “You’re quite safe.”

Unconsciously his arms tightened round her.  His breath quickened.  The satin-soft hair had brushed his cheek as she fell; the pale, exquisite face and warm white throat lay close beneath his lips—­all the fragrant beauty of her gathered unresisting against his heart.  He had only to stoop his head——­

With a stifled exclamation he jerked himself backward, squaring his shoulders, and released her, though he still steadied her with a hand beneath her arm.

“There, you are all right,” he said reassuringly.  “No bones broken.”

The commonplace words helped to restore her poise.

“Oh!  Thank you!” The words came a little gaspingly still.  “I—­I don’t know how I came to fall like that.  I think you startled me—­I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“I didn’t expect to be,” he returned, smiling a little.

Magda did not ask how it had come to pass.  For the moment it was enough for her that he was there—­that he had not gone away!  She was conscious of a sudden incomprehensible sense of tumult within her.

“It was lucky for me you happened to be standing just at the foot of the stairs,” she said a little unsteadily.

“I didn’t ‘happen.’  I was there of malice prepense”—­the familiar crooked smile flashed out—­“waiting for you.”

“Waiting for me?”

“Yes.  Lady Arabella asked me to shepherd you into the supper-room and see that you had a glass of champagne and a sandwich before the dancing begins.”

“Orders from headquarters?”—­smiling up at him.

“Exactly.”

He held out his arm and they moved away together.  As they passed through the crowded rooms one man murmured ironically to another: 

“Quarrington’s got it badly, I should say.”

The second man glanced after the pair with amused eyes.

“So he’s the latest victim, is he?  I head young Raynham’s nose was out of joint.”

“You don’t mean she’s fired him?”

The other nodded.

“Got the push the day before yesterday,” he answered tersely.

“Poor devil!  He’ll take it hard.  He’s a hotheaded youngster.  Just the sort to go off and blow his brains out.”

Meanwhile Quarrington had established Magda at a corner table in the empty supper-room and was seeing to it that Lady Arabella’s commands were obeyed, in spite of Magda’s assurances that she was not in the least hungry.

“Then you ought to be,” he replied.  “After dancing.  Besides, unlike the rest of us, you had no dinner.”

“Oh, I had a light meal at six o’clock.  But naturally, you can’t consume a solid dinner just before giving a performance.”

“I’m not going to pay you compliments about your dancing,” he observed quietly, after a pause.  “You must receive a surfeit of them.  But”—­looking at her with those direct grey eyes of his—­“I’m glad I didn’t leave England when I intended to.”