“Well, I shall say good-bye,” said the stranger. “If you ever happen to be in New York, and are interested in rare books, I shall be happy to show you what I have in my shop. Here is my card.”

Only Mr Maybee had the presence of mind to take it. The group broke up, and four of them went their different ways with painful and conflicting thoughts buzzing in their heads.

Long before the light began to fade on this beautiful June day the ladies of Salterton were dressing themselves for the dinner parties which came before the Ball. Already in the composing room of the local newspaper the long galleys of type were ranged in which their gowns were described, for the Society Editor had been busy on the telephone for three days past. Every lady who was to be present at the great affair had been called, and asked for a description of what she would wear; in some cases this call was inspired by courtesy rather than curiosity, for particularly among the older ladies it was not unknown for a gown to make several annual appearances, and the Society Editor could have done much of her work by simply consulting the back files. The descriptions which appeared were very brief; they conveyed nothing, to the stranger, of the real appearance of some of these remarkable garments; but to the informed reader they were rich in information. The briefest extract will suffice:

The persistent reader, seeking information about the ladies associated with the Little Theatre’s forthcoming production, might have compiled his own paragraph, thus:

The newspaper never made any mention of what the escorts of the ladies wore; it went without saying that they wore evening dress of every cut known during the past fifty years, and that the military wore dress uniforms, some of which had been made during their slimmer days, so that the trousers had been augmented at the back with gussets which were not always a perfect match.

Since half-past five Pearl Vambrace had been in her bedroom with the door locked. At three o’clock she had taken a long and elaborate bath, in the course of which she made a violent assault upon her armpits with her father’s razor. She had then composed herself for a nap, for she had read in a magazine that in order to look radiant at night, it was necessary to rest in the afternoon; such rest delayed the onset of crow’s feet, the article said, and Pearl, at nineteen, was determined to show no crow’s feet when she appeared at the Ball with Solly.

As she lay on her bed, trying to relax completely, she thought how astonishing it had been that Solly had asked her to go to the Ball with him. She had never, even in dreams, expected that Roger would ask her. He never seemed to pay any attention to her at all. At rehearsals he took her in his arms, and kissed her in the manner prescribed by Valentine, and although this experience terrified and ravished her it did nothing to make Roger less of a stranger: so must some maiden of the ancient world have felt when Jove descended and absent-mindedly made her his own. Even in the two private rehearsals, in her home, which Professor Vambrace had been able to impose upon the reluctant Roger, he had paid little attention to her. No, it was beyond the range of belief that Roger would ask her to go to the Ball with him, and when Pearl heard that Griselda was to be his partner she was too miserable even to be jealous. And then, astonishingly, Solly had asked her to go to the Ball with him, and shortly afterward a note had arrived from his mother, inviting her to dinner beforehand.

Relaxing completely was hard work. Try as she might to make herself heavy, and pretend that she was sinking through the bed, as the magazine had directed, she continued to twitch and jump unexpectedly. She would look dreadful at the Ball, she was sure—a mass of wrinkles, hollows and haggard shadows. And breath! Gargle as she might before going to the Bridgetowers’, how would she make sure afterward that her breath was—how did the advertisements put it?—“free of offence”? Could she slip her toothbrush and a tube of paste into her evening bag? She must sleep! She had a long and doubtless gay evening before her, in the company of a young man whom she scarcely knew. And even before the Ball began she had a dinner party! She had never been to a dinner party in her life, and she had heard that Mrs Bridgetower was a lady who demanded a high standard of elegant behaviour from her guests. She must relax! She must! In her efforts to relax Pearl twisted herself into a ball, and closed her eyes so tightly that the red darkness behind her eyelids seemed to writhe and surge.

Her misgivings would have been greater if she had had any idea of what had been in progress at the Bridgetower home during the past week. Solly had no particular desire to go to the Ball, but his mother had accepted their joint invitation on his behalf as well as her own. He felt that, if Griselda were to be there with Roger, he might as well be there himself, to keep an eye on her. But with whom? He must have a partner. His mother, in a fit of unaccustomed perverseness, had declared that it was impossible that he should go with her alone. He must have a suitable girl, and she would accompany them in the role of dowager and chaperone. But what girl? Cora Fielding was bespoken. Any other girl whose name he suggested was for one reason or another black-balled by his mother. Finally, in a fit of rebellion, he asked Pearl, whom he hardly knew, and when she regained her powers of speech she said, very politely, that she would be delighted.

Then the fat was in the fire! His mother had risen to new and, to her, refreshing heights of satire when he told her who his partner was to be. She had then decided that, whatever impossible social situations her son might prepare for her, she would comport herself with dignity and according to the rules of etiquette which she recognized. It was out of the question that the Vambraces should invite Solly to dinner before the Ball: therefore she would give a dinner party, and invite Pearl. It would not be a large party; her health would not permit of such a thing. But she would invite young Lieutenant Swackhammer, an officer in the Royal Canadian Navy who was the son of a cousin of her husband’s, and whoever he was taking to the Ball with him. This was, she later learned, a Miss Tompkins, to whom she sent a note of invitation.