with Andrew. And an interval having elapsed, Andrew was observed to
approach Helen and ask her for a polka. Helen punctiliously accepted.
And he led her out. The outraged gods of social decorum were appeased,
and the reputations of Mrs. Prockter and her parties stood as high as
ever. It was well and diplomatically done.

Nevertheless, the unforeseen came to pass. For at the end of the polka
Helen fainted on the grass; and not Andrew but Emanuel was first to
succour her. It was a highly disconcerting climax. Of course, Helen,
being Helen, recovered with singular rapidity. But that did not lighten
the mystery.

In the cab, going home, she wept. James could scarcely have believed it
of her.

"Oh, uncle," she half whispered, in a voice of grief, "you fiddled while
Rome was burning!"

This obscure saying baffled him, the more so that he had been playing a
concertina and not a fiddle at all. His feelings were vague, and in some
respects contradictory; but he was convinced that Mrs. Prockter's scheme
for separating Helen and the Apollo Emanuel was not precisely
succeeding.




CHAPTER XV

THE GIFT