Page:Glitter (1926).pdf/256

 tended they didn't hear the hammering and the clapping and the tooting and the cries for "Mo-o-ore!". ..

Then the orchestra struck up. The dancers tumbled out from the tables, pursing their lips to exhale their final hurried pulls of cigarette smoke, dragging their partners by the hand, or being dragged. The floor that but a moment since had held only Jock and Yvonne now seethed like a human ant hill, billowed and quivered and overflowed with people. The paper hats bobbed, the hectic faces simpered, the bodies collided and churned. . . collided and churned. . . collided. . . . And the music fretted and thumped:

"There's a cunning child," said Yvonne.

Jock looked away from the floor and followed the line of her glance. "Where?"

"The one in red, at the table by the post."

He saw the back of a close-cropped brown head, a little column of neck with a choker necklace of pearls, a V of milky skin where the red gown was cut low. "How can you tell from the back?" he said idly.

"She looked this way a minute ago," answered Yvonne, also idly.

"Well, I don't envy her the boy-friend she's got,"