Penny Blood Serial Fiction — page 379: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

362 REYNOLDS’ WORKS sufficiently eligible to warrant her in jilting Mr. Hawkshaw. If so, she was prepared to take that step. Although now acquainted with the stratagem which Frank had executed to put her to the test, she had such confidence in her own charms, her fascinations, and her endearments, as to flatter herself that she need only bring them all into full play in order to reduce him to the condition of a suppliant at her feet. Nevertheless, with all her natural effrontery, with all her spirit of intrigue, with all her worldly-minded calcu- lating disposition, she could not help feeling embarrassed and awkward during the first few minutes they were thus thrown together on the present occasion. Moreover, her pride would not suffer her to be the first to break the silence which still reigned between them, and there was also a certain amount of rancour and bitterness in her mind at the test to which young Paton had so ingeniously put her. Frank likewise experienced all the awkwardness of this silence, and if he did not immediately speak, 1t was that he knew not how to commence the conversation. He more than half-regretted having placed himself in such a position. He began to comprehend that 1t was his own little pride and boyish vanity, more than anything else, that had all along urged him to be present at this ball; and he felt some- what humiliated in his own eyes, lessened in his own conceit, diminished in his own opinion, at the thought that he should have been guilty of such weakness. But soon he began to reflect that having become Miss Farefield’s companion for the present, he had no right to treat her with a reserve or coolness that could not fail to be shortly noticed by other couples lounging or sitting in the ballroom, and notwith- standing all circumstances, he saw that he was bound to treat her at least with a show of external courtesy and politeness. “Do you prefer to remain seated here, Miss Farefield? ”’ he inquired, not knowing what else to say, ‘‘ or would you rather walk a little? ” “T am perfectly well contented,’ she responded, “ to do whichever Mr. Paton thinks fit,’’ and as she thus spoke, in a tone of mingled reproach and archness, she accentuated his name. “The quadrille is about to commence,” he said; “‘ shall we stand up and take our places? ”’ “With pleasure. Are you fond of dancing? ” Gomicbooks (E(0)