He faced her picture with his eyes resolute, his jaw thrust out.
"I'll do it," he told the lifeless print. "I'll make you know me. I'll teach your brother not to treat me as a servant who has forgotten his place."
The last, in any case, couldn't be safely put off. Lambert's manner had already aroused Betty's interest. Had she known its cause she might not have resented it so sweetly for George. There was no point in fretting any more. His mind was made up to challenge at the earliest possible moment.
In furtherance of his resolution he visited his tailor the next day, and during the evening called at the Baillys'. He came straight to the point.
"I want some dancing lessons," he said. "Do you know anybody?"
Bailly limped up, put his hands on George's shoulder, and studied him.
"He's going to Betty Alston's dance," Mrs. Bailly cried.
"If I'm asked," George admitted, "but as a general principle----"
Mrs. Bailly interrupted, assuming control.
"Move that table and the chairs," she directed the two men. "You'll keep my husband's secret--tinkling music hidden away between grand opera records. It will come in handy now."
George protested, but she had her own way. Bailly sat by, puffing at his pipe, at first scornful.
"I hate to see a football player pirouetting like a clown."
But in a little while he was up, awkwardly illustrating steps, his cheeks flushed, his cold pipe dangling from his lips.
"You dance very well as it is," Mrs. Bailly told George. "You do need a little quieting. You must learn to remember that the ballroom isn't a gridiron and your partner the ball."
And at the end of a fortnight she told him he was tamed and ready for the soft and perfumed exercise of the dance floor.
He was afraid Betty wouldn't remember. Her invitation had been informal, his response almost a refusal.
On free afternoons Goodhue and he often ran together, trying to keep in condition, already feeling that the outcome of next year's big games would depend on them. They trotted openly through the Alston place, hoping for a glimpse of Betty as a break in their grind. When she saw them from the house she would come out and chat for a time, her yellow hair straying in the wind, her cheeks flushed from the cold. During these brief conferences it was made clear that she had not forgotten, and that George would go up with Goodhue and be a guest at his home the night of the dance.