Julius Beaufort's ballroom stays shuttered for three hundred and sixty-four days a year, its chandelier in a bag and its gilt chairs stacked in a corner. On the one night it opens, it makes up for whatever is regrettable in the Beaufort past. Beaufort passes for an Englishman, has a bitter tongue and mysterious origins, and is whispered to have been "helped" to leave England. Yet for twenty years New York has gone to his house as calmly as to old Mrs Mingott's, and with better wine. Mrs Archer's axiom, "We all have our pet common people", says the rest.
Archer arrives late and nervous. He has walked up Fifth Avenue fearing that the Mingotts will bring Countess Olenska, and he feels less eager to champion her than he did at the Opera. Instead he finds May at the ballroom door with her lilies-of-the-valley, announcing the engagement while Mrs Welland plays the reluctant mother. May's eyes say, "Remember, we're doing this because it's right." Archer agrees, though he wishes the reason were something nobler than poor Ellen.
On the floor he tells May that now they shan't have to talk, and she says nothing. In the conservatory he kisses her quickly, then moves them to a less hidden sofa to make up for it. When she asks whether he told Ellen, he fibs that he had no chance. Ellen, May explains, decided at the last minute that her dress was not smart enough, so an aunt took her home. May knows the real reason Ellen stayed away, and Archer knows she knows. Neither will say so.
Coming Up in Chapter 4
The next day the betrothal visits begin. Archer drives with Mrs Welland and May to old Mrs Manson Mingott's cream-coloured house, where the vast old lady sits at her ground-floor window, two tiny white hands resting on waves of black silk, calmly waiting for fashion to flow north to her door.
