"Stop this, stop this," said her husband, giving her a little shake.
"I am really afraid Hilda isn’t well," said Gorham with concern. "I am sorry if she is too tired, for I wanted to see if you all wouldn’t like to come over to the dance at the hotel to-night."
"That is sensible, profoundly sensible," remarked his brother. "What could finish off a day at the Fair more appropriately than a dancing party!"
"You’ve got to go, Robert," said Hilda, wiping her eyes. "It will be lovely. We will smoke on the piazza, and watch the others through the windows."
"Yes, I know how you enjoy looking on at a dancing party."
"Yes, thank you, Gorham, we will come," continued Mrs. Page relentlessly. "I shall just go down to the Court of Honor for one last look," she added, sighing. "I will go up in that little balcony at the corner of the Electrical Building, and gaze once more down the stately, spacious square. I shall see the peacock-blue lake through the columns of the Peristyle, look up into the Italian sky roofing all, and say my prayers or sing the doxology; then I shall come home and pack. Oh, Robert, how can we leave it all!"
That evening Jack entered the parlor and found Clover leaning back in an armchair. He dropped into a seat beside her.
"You look fitter to adorn some marble shrine in the White City than to decorate a humdrum, mortal home," he remarked, regarding her thin gown approvingly.
"I believe I never saw you before in a dress-suit," she answered lazily. "You look very neat, my dear. That is what mother used to say to us to suppress our vanity, when we were in festive array. It is rather amusing to see Fair pilgrims in evening dress, isn’t it?"
"Where is Mildred?" asked Van Tassel, looking about.
"She will be here directly. If my sister were entirely costumed at any appointed time, I should be anxious about her."
"I haven’t had a chance to confess before," went on Jack, low and hastily. "I spoke to her too soon, after all. I need a keeper."
Clover looked dismayed, and her tone was heart-felt.
"The milk is spilled, though; there is no going back. Didn’t she tell you?"
"Days since, then. You are a wonder, Jack. Are you going to stay here and live it down?"
"I am going to stay here if you will let me."