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Oddly enough Abner's feeling of the wickedness of the pastime evaporated completely in a stab of jealousy that Sharp's arms should be around Adelaide. He felt a sick envy of the lawyer. He watched the couple with little waves of cold and hot running over his skin. Sharp was in evening wear, and his black arm around Adelaide's waist; his white plump hand placed delicately sidewise against her shimmering green gown was the most exasperating spectacle that ever gnawed at Abner's patience. The girl's waist looked so slender in the revealing silk; her shoulders so white. Abner believed Sharp wanted to press in feverishly on that svelte waist, and then to hold his hand just so—"The damned hypocrite!" cursed the teamster under his breath. "He sha'n't have my land suits any more. I'll take 'em away from him!"

The united movements of the dancers suggested some profound sympathy between the two, some exquisite intimacy from which Abner felt for ever excluded. Adelaide was a sort of celestial creature whom his own arms might never encompass. If he might embrace her, put his arms about her—the voluptuousness of the fancy sent tremors through him.

The dancers swayed along languorously, but at intervals broke into a little running step which ended by swinging their feet lightly about and turning in a new direction. How Sharp managed his bulk so deftly, Abner could not imagine. The softly swaying bodies, masculine black, feminine green, were maddening. They were talking to each other, apparently lost in a dream. He saw Adelaide lift her brows, nod happily, her eyes scintillant with happiness.

And suddenly Abner knew that Sharp had asked Adelaide to marry him and had been accepted. His heart went down and down. His resentment at Sharp's embrace trailed off into sheer unrelieved misery. She was going to become Sharp's wife. The teamster thought he would go home.

At this point the palpitations of the jazz ceased; the dancers came to a standstill with a great clapping of hands.