CHAPTER XXVI

I had been asked to the Gills’ for eight o’clock, and at half-past six I began to dress. After posting my acceptance my next care had been in regard to the clothes I should wear. There is no doubt greatly increased opportunities had tended to develop in me a latent dandyism. At all events I took the matter of my dress quite seriously, and had very definite ideas in regard to it. I went to the best tailor in town, my bills were sent on to Mrs. Carroll, and that was all I knew about them. I tried to get the soft greys and blacks and whites I admired in old Spanish and Dutch portraits, with perhaps a colour-note of olive green in my neck-tie, but always with the tones kept low and harmonious. Dandyism certainly, but it was in its way merely an expression of those same sensibilities that enabled me to see the charm of the pictures I have mentioned; that is to say, it was not based on any feeling of personal vanity, for I had no illusions in regard to my beauty. So, in this particular instance, I took immense pains to see that everything should be exactly right, and at the same time pleasing to myself. The cloth I had chosen was of the very blackest and finest and softest. Each garment had to be fitted on me till I could find no fault in it. The broad braid down the sides of my trousers seemed to me perfectly decorative. It was really in its use of linen that modern dress most conspicuously failed: what would Franz Hals or Velasquez have thought of the stiff, glazed collar convention obliged me to wear?

When I had finished dressing I looked at myself critically in the inadequate glass, beside which I had set two or three candles, standing in pools of their own grease. It seemed to me that the peculiar, sullen expression of my face, caused by the formation of my forehead and the shape of my mouth, must always create an unfavourable impression. If I could recognise it myself, it would probably be a great deal more striking to other people. It disappeared when I smiled, but as soon as I stopped smiling it came back again.

I went downstairs and strutted about before Miss Izzy and little Alice, that they might admire my fine feathers, and it was only when I reached the Gills that every other feeling was swallowed up in a horrible shyness.

The whole house was brilliantly lit up, and I was shown to a room already half-filled with boys, who were removing their overcoats, putting on their dancing shoes, talking and laughing perfectly easily, just as if the most frightful ordeal were not staring them in the face. Evidently they all knew each other quite well, whereas I knew nobody. Owen came up, indeed, and spoke to me, but forsook me almost immediately, as people were arriving every minute, two or three of them, I observed, quite grown-up. I wished Owen would come back. When I saw a boy I knew slightly and heartily disliked, I was ready to welcome him as the oldest and dearest of friends, but, not being in my solitary condition, he merely nodded to me, and went over to join a group at the other side of the room. I was left standing by myself, not knowing what to do; and all the time fresh guests were arriving, and I felt I was in the way, but could not summon up courage to make a movement. I now bitterly regretted having been such a fool as to come. I noticed several other boys with whom I had a casual acquaintance at school, but beyond nodding they paid no attention to me, and I became filled with rage against them and against Owen himself. Then I heard a voice saying over my shoulder, “If you’re ready you may as well come upstairs.”

It was Owen, and I followed him obediently. I passed a group of boys loitering outside an open door, and found myself all at once in a large room. The light at first half-dazzled me. With a heart furiously beating I was led up to a tall, slight lady in black, who was standing near the fireplace. This was Owen’s mother. I shook hands with her, and with his father, and with one of his elder sisters. But when this was accomplished I was again in that horrible position of not knowing what to do and being afraid to move. Owen had once more deserted me. All about me were a crowd of brightly-dressed girls, chattering and laughing among themselves, and pretending not to look at me. The boys, with whom I would have liked now to be back again, were hovering near the door, and I tried to screw up my courage to the point of crossing the room. Then somebody――I think it was Owen’s sister――gave me a programme. I stood clasping it tightly in my hand. It seemed to me now unthinkably idiotic that I should voluntarily have placed myself in this position of torture, when all I had had to do was to refuse the invitation and stay at home. At that moment a lady to whom I had not been introduced spoke to me, though I was too much upset to hear what she said. She had a pleasant smile, a voice soft and attractive, and she asked me my name, and told me I must get some partners. Many of the other boys, I noticed, had begun to ask for dances, and were scribbling down names in their programmes. My new friend bore me off to a fair-haired, fair-skinned, demure-looking maiden in a pink, fleecy dress, and introduced me. Unfortunately, at this point, one of the grown-up persons, a tall young man, called out, “Annie, half a mo,” and my protectress turned away, leaving me to make my own advances. I could do nothing. How could I ask this wretched girl to dance with me when I had never danced in my life? For an agonizing moment I stood there; then I stammered out something, turned on my heel abruptly, and walked away.

It was dreadful. Before me I saw a conservatory, the door of which was open, and I escaped into it as my only refuge. I felt utterly miserable. It occurred to me to slip out quietly and go home, but to do that I should have to cross the room, and somebody would be sure to pounce upon me. Besides, what would the McAllisters think? The first dance had commenced, and I saw that my golden-haired maiden had found another partner. He happened to be one of the boys I knew, and I was certain she would tell him what I had done, and that everybody at school would get to know about it.

In the midst of the dance the lady called Annie bore straight down upon me, having detected my hiding-place. But she did not seem angry; on the contrary, she was laughing. She threaded her way among the palms, while I felt my face becoming purple.

“What do you mean by running away like that from the partners I choose for you?” she asked gaily. “Elsie told me you wouldn’t ask her to dance, and she says it’s my fault, that I made you come when you didn’t want to.”

“I can’t dance,” I answered huskily. Nevertheless, Elsie’s explanation of my conduct, in spite of the fact that it redoubled its rudeness, gave me relief.

The “Annie” lady looked at me, still laughing. Then she said very kindly, “Oh, don’t mind; it really doesn’t matter in the least. Come and dance with me.”

“But I can’t,” I muttered, “I never tried in my life.”

“Well, come and talk to me then, and we can watch the others.”

She led me back into the room. She asked me all kinds of questions about myself, and very soon I was chattering away as if I had known her all my life. I had forgotten what an extremely small boy I had been only ten minutes ago, as I looked about me boldly, and gave “Annie” my opinion on all kinds of things.

We talked of the opera, and when she told me she preferred the “Trovatore” to “Lohengrin” I thought her taste very crude. All the same I liked her. She laughed in a nice way, and was interested in everything you said to her. I pulled up my trousers a little so that my delicate silk socks should be more visible. As I glanced round the room I decided that I was much better dressed than anybody there, and this conviction increased my confidence. I would have liked to ask “Annie” what she thought of me from this point of view, but instead, she inquired if I was fond of reading. I replied in the affirmative, and she asked me if I had read “Tom Brown’s School-days.” I again said, “Yes,” and asked her if she had read “Anna Karénine.”

“What a curious book for you to get hold of! I should have thought you would have preferred ‘The Coral Island,’ or ‘Midshipman Easy.’ Those are the kind of books _my_ brothers like. That is one of my brothers there, that fat ugly boy with red hair, dancing with the little girl in white.”

I inspected the brother. “‘Anna Karénine’ is a fine book,” I answered. “Why didn’t she ask for the divorce at once, do you think? I mean as soon as she went away with Wronsky?”

Out of the tail of my eye I saw the young man who had before interfered between us again approaching. She saw him too, and immediately called out, “Bertie, we’re discussing ‘Anna Karénine.’ I’m sure you haven’t read it.”

We didn’t really discuss it, for she changed the subject directly afterwards, without even having answered my question, and Bertie, who I heard later was a football player of great renown, asked me if my school was going to win the cup this year. The first square dance “Annie” insisted on my dancing with her, and, so far as I could judge, I shuffled through it all right. After that she left me to my own resources, and I returned to Bertie. There was something between Bertie and her, I believed. I was sure he had only come because she had told him she was going to be there to help to look after the kids. Bertie had danced all the dances up to this one, but he now told me that if he didn’t have a smoke he should die, and asked me to come to the billiard-room with him. We played a hundred up, Bertie going two to my one, but I beat him, for I had often knocked the balls about on the table at Derryaghy, though there was rarely anybody to have a game with. Bertie said I should make a good player if I practised, and he showed me a lot of strokes. He was very jolly and I liked him. Presently he asked me if I didn’t want some supper, and we went downstairs. Refreshments had been going on all the evening, but the room happened to be empty when we came in. There was a great deal of lemonade and stuff, but Bertie secured some champagne, and by the time I had had two glasses I began to feel extremely comfortable and jolly. Bertie’s jokes were twice as good as they had been before, and my own conversation suddenly acquired an interest and brilliancy that made me want to talk as much as possible. After my third glass Bertie suggested I should try Apollinaris, but I refused. The room had somehow by this time got full of people. Bertie told me to keep quiet, but just then he was called away, and I was left to finish my supper alone.