It was Lawrence, and not Miss Arden, who objected to the arrangement. He complained that he did not know Mrs. Elmsley, whoever she might be, and he did not like to let his little girl join what might very well prove to be a fast set. However, Mrs. Cockburn and her husband came in that evening to make up a bridge-four, and Lawrence was so pleased by Mrs. Cockburn’s appearance and the excellent game she played that it was only necessary for her to use a very little flattery before he consented graciously to allow Elizabeth to join the club.

So on Friday Elizabeth was driven in fear and trembling to the Knightsbridge Hotel, where the club met. She was purposely late because she had thought how awful it would be to arrive before any of the others, but now, as she entered the ball-room and saw the dense throng of people, she wondered why ever she had been so stupid, and how ever she was to find Sarah in this crowd. Some of the people circling slowly past her no doubt belonged to the club, others were merely habitues of the Knightsbridge, where a public dance club was held. How to distinguish the party to which she belonged, and how to find their table?

Then she saw Sarah in the arms of a very tall man, and Sarah stopped fox-trotting to tell her that their party was sitting in that corner, where those two girls were. She slid back into the throng, and Elizabeth was left to worm her way round the room to where several people were sitting, drinking iced-coffee, and smoking cigarettes.

Elizabeth sat down shyly beside a fair girl who looked rather less terrifying than anyone else, and murmured that Miss Cockburn had told her to come.

The fair girl looked at her and smiled.

“Oh, you must be Elizabeth Arden! So glad you turned up. I’m Lucy Elmsley. How d’you do?”

Elizabeth, who had expected to find Mrs. Elmsley a responsible dowager, gasped.

“That’s my husband over there, flirting with May Kimball. Isn’t he the limit? George, come and be introduced to Miss Arden!”

George came, and as soon as he smiled Elizabeth thought what a dear he was. He introduced her to several men, and one of them asked if she would like to stagger round the room, now, before the band stopped playing this topping tune. So as Lucy Elmsley had drifted away to where a very fat man was standing, Elizabeth squeezed her way out between two tables, and began to dance with Chubby—this appeared to be her partner’s name; he was introduced to her as that.

By the time she and Chubby, who turned out to be a most amusing youth with a vocabulary quite his own, returned to their corner of the room, nearly all the chairs were occupied by the rest of the party.