Dotty and Jingo made dinner a rather lively affair, shouting at each-other from their opposite ends of the table (being the ranking male, Jingo was of course Aunt Em's partner), telling jokes and gossipy stories, and otherwise being noisy and fun; but they weren't overbearing, they managed to include everyone in the conversation, they simply provided the driving force.
People often assume that Dotty is, well, dotty, due to her incredible frivolity and the saccharine quality of her porcelain-doll prettiness; but she's one of the cleverest women I know. She has a genius for making people have fun, frequently in spite of themselves; she's also an incredible mimic, particularly of voices, and has given herself a very mush-mouthed Mayfair accent despite having been born and bred "in the sound of Bow bells." Her giddiness wasn't an act, though, as Caro's was: it was a natural effusion of her desire to entertain everyone around her; and she kept her cleverness to herself so that her friends' enjoyment would not be marred by the knowledge that they were being skillfully manipulated like puppets.
After dinner, Dotty wanted to dance, and prevailed upon me to have the music-room carpet rolled back and the gramophone brought out. She provided her own recordings, fortunately, since I didn't think the Foxbridge collection got any livelier than a Viennese waltz; and her and Jingo's enthusiasm for the Charleston and the Black Bottom was infectious, and soon we were all flinging ourselves about in accepted nightclub fashion (well, most of us, anyway--Nanny and Lady Heard sat out the festivities, though Silenus and Aunt Em took a few sedate turns).
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