Contrary Mary

"How do you know?"

"Because I do."

"Yet the other day you hinted that Delilah Jeliffe wasn't a lady, not in

your sense of the word--and that I couldn't see the difference because

was a man. I'll let you have your opinion of Delilah Jeliffe if you'll

let me have mine of Roger Poole."

So Mary compromised by having Roger down for the evening. "We shall be

just a family party for dinner," she said. "But later, we are asking

some others for candle-lighting time. We want everybody to come prepared

to tell a story or recite, or to sing, or play--in the dark at first, and

then with the candles."

His pride urged him to refuse--to spurn this offer of hospitality from

the girl who had once forgotten that he was in the house!

But as he stood there on the threshold of the Tower Rooms, her smile

seemed to draw him, her voice called him, and he was young--and

desperately lonely.

So as he dressed carefully on Thanksgiving afternoon, he had a sense of

exhilaration. For one night he would let himself go. He would be

himself. No one should snub him. Snubs came from self-consciousness--he

who was above them need not see them.

When at last he entered the drawing-room, it was unillumined except for

the flickering flame of a fire of oak logs. The guests, assembling

wraith-like among the shadows, were given, each, an unlighted candle.

Roger found a place in a big chair beside the piano, and sat there alone,

interested and curious. And presently Pittiwitz, stealing toward the

hearth, arched her back under his hand, and he reached down and lifted

her to his knee, where she stretched herself, sphinx-like, her amber eyes

shining in the dusk.

With the last guest seated, Barry stood before them, and gave the key to

the situation.

"Everybody is to light a candle with some stunt," he explained. "You

know the idea. All of you have some parlor tricks, and you're to show

them off."

There were no immediate volunteers, so Barry pounced on Leila.

"You begin," he said, and drew her into the circle of the firelight.

She looked very childish and sweet as she stood there with her unlighted

candle, and sang a lullaby. Mary Ballard played her accompaniment

softly, sitting so near to Roger in his dim corner that the folds of her

velvet gown swept his foot.

And when the song was finished, Leila touched a match to her candle and

stood on tiptoe to set it on the corner of the mantel, where it glimmered

bravely.