His big frame shook with the fun of it, for none in the colony could be jollier than he on holiday occasions:  and the group of ladies and gentlemen beside him caught the infection, so that I was sore put to it.

“Will your Excellency confess likewise?” I demanded.

“So I will, Richard, and make patent to all the world that she hath the remains of that shuttlecock, my heart.”

Up gets his Excellency (for so we still called him) and makes Dolly a low reverence, kissing the tips of her white fingers.  My lady drops a mock curtsey in return.

“Your Excellency can do no less than sue for a dance,” drawled Dr. Courtenay.

“And no more, I fear, sir, not being so nimble as I once was.  I resign in your favour, doctor,” said Colonel Sharpe.

Dr. Courtenay made his bow, his hat tucked under his arm.  But he had much to learn of Miss Manners if he thought that even one who had been governor of the province could command her.  The music was just begun again, and I making off in the direction of Patty Swain, when I was brought up as suddenly as by a rope.  A curl was upon Dorothy’s lips.

“The dance belongs to Richard, doctor,” she said.

“Egad, Courtenay, there you have a buffer!” cried Colonel Sharpe, as the much-discomfited doctor bowed with a very ill grace; while I, in no small bewilderment, walked off with Dorothy.  And a parting shot of the delighted colonel brought the crimson to my face.  Like the wind or April weather was my lady, and her ways far beyond such a great simpleton as I.

“So I am ever forced to ask you to dance!” said Dolly.

“What were you about, moping off alone, with a party in your honour, sir?”

“I was watching you, as I told his Excellency.”

“Oh, fie!” she cried.  “Why don’t you assert yourself, Richard?  There was a time when you gave me no peace.”

“And then you rebuked me for dangling,” I retorted.

Up started the music, the fiddlers bending over their bows with flushed faces, having dipped into the cool punch in the interval.  Away flung my lady to meet Singleton, while I swung Patty, who squeezed my hand in return.  And soon we were in the heat of it,—­sober minuet no longer, but romp and riot, the screams of the lasses a-mingle with our own laughter, as we spun them until they were dizzy.  My brain was a-whirl as well, and presently I awoke to find Dolly pinching my arm.

“Have you forgotten me, Richard?” she whispered.  “My other hand, sir.  It is I down the middle.”

Down we flew between the laughing lines, Dolly tripping with her head high, and then back under the clasped hands in the midst of a fire of raillery.  Then the music stopped.  Some strange exhilaration was in Dorothy.

“Do you remember the place where I used to play fairy godmother, and wind the flowers into my hair?” said she.

What need to ask?

“Come!” she commanded decisively.