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XACTLY when the ball began Leila would have found it hard to say. Perhaps her first real partner was the cab. It did not matter that she shared the cab with the Sheridan girls and their brother. She sat back in her own little corner of it, and the bolster on which her hand rested felt like the sleeve of an unknown young man’s dress suit; and away they bowled, past waltzing lamp-posts and houses and fences and trees.

“Have you really never been to a ball before, Leila? But, my child, how too weird” cried the Sheridan girls.

“Our nearest neighbour was fifteen miles,” said Leila softly, gently opening and shutting her fan.

Oh, dear, how hard it was to be indifferent like the others! She tried not to smile too much; she tried not to care. But every single thing was so new and exciting Meg’s tuberoses, Jose’s long loop of amber, Laura’s little dark head, pushing above her white fur 208