“Oh, fie!  You deny her?” says Dolly.  “I did not think that of you, Richard.”

“You should know better,” I replied, with some bitterness.

We were talking in low tones, Dolly with her head turned from the stage, whence the doctor was flinging his impassioned speeches in vain.  And though the light fell not upon her face, I seemed to feel her looking me through and through.

“You do not care for Patty?” she whispered.  And I thought a quiver of earnestness was in her voice.  Her face was so close to mine that her breath fanned my cheek.

“No,” I said.  “Why do you ask me?  Have I ever been one to make pretences?”

She turned away.

“But you,” I said, bending to her ear, “is it Fitzhugh, Dorothy?”

I heard her laugh softly.

“No,” said she, “I thought you might divine, sir.”

Was it possible?  And yet she had played so much with me that I dared not risk the fire.  She had too many accomplished gallants at her feet to think of Richard, who had no novelty and no wit.  I sat still, barely conscious of the rising and falling voices beyond the footlights, feeling only her living presence at my side.  She spoke not another word until the playhouse servants had relighted the chandeliers, and Dr. Courtenay came in, flushed with triumph, for his mead of praise.

“And how went it, Miss Manners?” says he, very confident.

“Why, you fell over the orchard wall, doctor,” retorts my lady.  “La!  I believe I could have climbed it better myself.”

And all he got was a hearty laugh for his pains, Mr. Marmaduke joining in from the back of the box.  And the story was at the Coffee House early on the morrow.

CHAPTER XI

A FESTIVAL AND A PARTING

My grandfather and I were seated at table together.  It was early June, the birds were singing in the garden, and the sweet odours of the flowers were wafted into the room.

“Richard,” says he, when Scipio had poured his claret, “my illness cheated you out of your festival last year.  I dare swear you deem yourself too old for birthdays now.”

I laughed.

“So it is with lads,” said Mr. Carvel; “they will rush into manhood as heedless as you please.  Take my counsel, boy, and remain young.  Do not cross the bridge before you have to.  And I have been thinking that we shall have your fete this year, albeit you are grown, and Miss Dolly is the belle of the province.  ’Tis like sunshine into my old heart to see the lads and lasses again, and to hear the merry, merry fiddling.  I will have his new Excellency, who seems a good and a kindly man, and Lloyd and Tilghman and Dulany and the rest, with their ladies, to sit with me.  And there will be plenty of punch and syllabub and sangaree, I warrant; and tarts and jellies and custards, too, for the misses.  Ring for Mrs. Willis, my son.”