She turned his page. Her eyes wandered to Mrs. Henty, who sat with her back to her. Sophie contemplated the bow of her back in its black frock with Spanish lace scarf across it, the outline of the black lace on the wrinkled skin of Mrs. Henty's neck, the loose, upward wave of her crisp white hair, glinting silverly where the light caught it. Her face was cobwebbed with wrinkles, but her features remained delicate and fine as sculpturings in ancient ivory. Her eyes were bright: the sparkle of youth still leapt in them. Her eyes had a slight smile of secret sympathy and amusement as they flew over the roomful of people dancing.
Sophie watched dance after dance, while the music jingled and jangled.
Presently John Armitage appeared in the doorway with Nina Henty. Sophie heard him apologising to Mrs. Henty for being late, and explaining that he had stayed in the back-country a few days longer than usual for the express purpose of coming to the ball.
Mrs. Henty replied that it was "better late than never," and a pleasure to see Mr. Armitage at any time; and then he and Nina joined the throng of the dancers.
Sophie drew her chair further back so that the piano screened her. The disappointment and stillness which had descended upon her since she came into the room tightened and settled. She had thought Arthur would surely come to ask her for this dance; but when the waltz began she saw he was dancing again with Phyllis Chelmsford. She sat very still, holding herself so that she should not feel a pain which was hovering in the background of her consciousness and waiting to grip her.
It was different, this sitting on a chair by herself and watching other people dance, to anything that had ever happened to her. She had always been the centre of Ridge balls, courted and made a lot of from the moment she came into the hall. Even Arthur Henty had had to shoulder his way if he wanted a waltz with her.
As the crowd brushed and swirled round the room, it became all blurred to Sophie. The last rag of that mood of tremulous joyousness which had invested her as she drove over the plains to the ball with her father, left her. She sat very still; she could not see for a moment. The waltz broke because she did not hear her father when he called her to turn the page of his music; he knocked over his stand trying to turn the page himself, and exclaimed angrily when Sophie did not jump to pick it up for him.