Gunther, with his direct, almost obtrusive stare, studied her with unusual curiosity, conversed a little, and departed, after receiving a cordial invitation from her to call.
"What is the matter with you, Rita?" said Beecher immediately.
"Really, do I seem so?" she said, waving to some one on the floor.
"I am generally--dormant," she said, laughing. "Yes, I am excited tonight."
"You are on the track of the ring--you have found it," he said instantly, with a pang of disappointment.
An idea came to him. He imagined that she too, like the good gambler he felt her to be, was laughing before the irretrievable disaster of the morrow.
"Look here, Rita," he said sympathetically, "you're not caught in the stock market, are you?
"No, no, of course not." She saw the look on his face, and was touched by it. "Ruined and dying game? No, no; I am excited, very much excited, that's all. Will you ask me to dance, sir?"
Some of the more ardent spirits, impatient for the crowd to thin out, were whirling about, clearing an expanding circle by force of their revolving attacks. In a moment they were moving among the dancers.
Mrs. Kildair danced remarkably well. In this lithe body, so pliant and yet so inspired with the vertigo of the waltz, Beecher was again aware of the strange excitement that seemed to animate her whole being, and continued to ask himself the cause of such an unusual emotion. From time to time, the light fingers on his arms contracted imperiously, urging him to a wilder measure. He had a strange sensation of mystery and flight, as though he were no longer dancing, but whirling around with her in his arms, each striving, in the frantic flight, to conquer the other.
The dance ended. The spectators burst into applause. Mrs. Kildair, half opening her eyes, thanked him with a grateful smile. He walked away with her on his arm, agitated and troubled. What all the brilliance of Emma Fornez had not been able to accomplish, one touch of Rita Kildair had effected.
"I've lots of things to ask you," he said hurriedly, remembering McKenna's suggestions.
"No, no; not now--tomorrow," she said breathlessly, with the same caressing, half-veiled look. She gave him her hand in dismissal.
He understood. The sensation which had come in the few moments of their vertigo had been too extraordinary to be dimmed by a descent to conversation.