"Mademoiselle," I said, as I left her, "you are Ellen, and you have a heart! At half past ten I shall come again. Some day I shall take away your mask and your heart."
At half past ten I had kept my word, and I stood once more at the Row of Mystery. The chairs were vacant, for the blue coats had wrought havoc there! A little apart sat a blonde beauty of petite figure, who talked in a deep contralto voice, astonishing for one so slight, with a young lieutenant who leaned close to her. I selected her for Tudie Devlin of Kentucky. She whom I fancied to be the "Evans girl from up North," was just promenading away with a young man in evening dress. A brunette whom I imagined to be Sadie Galloway of the Ninth was leaning on the back of a chair and conversing with a man whom I could not see, hidden in the shade of a tent fold. I looked behind me and saw a row of disgruntled gentlemen, nervously pacing up and down. At least there were others disappointed!
I searched the dancing floor and presently wished I had not done so. I saw her once more--dancing with a tall, slender man in uniform. At least he offered no disguise to me. In my heart I resented seeing him wear the blue of our government. And certainly it gave me some pang to which I was not entitled, which I did not stop to analyze, some feeling of wretchedness, to see this girl dancing with none less than Gordon Orme, minister of the Gospel, captain of the English Army, and what other inconsistent things I knew not!
"Buck up, Jack," I heard a voice at my side. "Did she run away from you?"
I feigned ignorance to Kitty. "They are all alike," said I, indifferently. "All dressed alike--"
"I saw but one," I admitted, "the one with a red heart on her corsage."
Kitty laughed a merry peal. "There were twelve red hearts," she said. "All there, and all offered to any who might take them. Silly, silly! Now, I wonder if indeed you did meet Ellen? Come, I'll introduce you to a hundred more, the nicest girls you ever saw."
"How should I know? I did not see you. I was too busy flirting with my husband--for after awhile I found that it was Matt, of course! It seems some sort of fate that I never see a handsome man who doesn't turn out to be Matt."