Page:Pleased to Meet You (1927).pdf/74

 active participation. "He's as lively as the Grand Duke. I wish he were President." She had a vague feeling that with so sportive a person around there might, even in a Republic, be some chance for the winsome intrigue that makes life tolerable to females. Even the scandalized Romsteck, gazing where Geneva's expert was now astride the beer-keg, hastening the flow by mouth organ madrigals, had to admit that the Colonel had done much to enliven the party.

The President also was not far from the beer, cheerfully engrossed in talk with the reporters, who wore the specially professional look of those who approve what they have seen and are getting ready to write a favourable story for the papers. Nyla, seeing her father's air of satisfaction, was thoroughly happy. The Colonel insisted on dancing repeatedly; in these country measures he was agile rather than practiced, but there was a pleasant quaintness in his figures and he had a piquant habit of uttering enigmatic phrases.