Part 10 (2/2)

To the rescue of his embarra.s.sment came the thought that indeed he obviously could not tread on the rose, unless he were a contortionist, because the rose was----

Among the smudges of black, his cheeks burned a hot red. He thrust a hand between his s.h.i.+rt and waistcoat and produced the coveted flower: a snow-rose in the center of his grimy palm.

Again the perfume, subtle, haunting. Again the pure mountain-peaks.

Again the music of a poem in a tongue unknown....

At first he did not dare to look at her; he kept his gaze lowered. Had he looked, he would have seen her wide eyes startle, then change to amus.e.m.e.nt, and then to a doubting tenderness. He felt her delicate fingers touch his palm and he thrilled at the touch as she recaptured her rose. He did not see that, in welcome to the returned prodigal, she started to raise to her own lips those petals, gathered so tight against the flower's heart, which he had lately kissed. When at last he glanced up, she had recovered her poise and was again looking like some sculptured Artemis that had wandered into his lonely room from the gardens of the Luxembourg.

Then he saw a much more prosaic thing. He saw the hand that held the rose and saw it discolored.

”Will you ever forgive me?” he cried. ”You've been leaning on my table, and I mix my paints on it!”

The speech was not precisely pellucid, but she followed his eyes to the hand and understood.

”The fault was mine,” she said.

Cartaret was searching among the tubes and bottles on the table. He searched so nervously that he knocked some of them to the floor.

”If you'll just wait a minute.” He found the bottle he wanted. ”And if you don't mind the turpentine.... It smells terribly, but it will evaporate soon, and it cleans you up before you know it.”

He lifted one of the rags that lay about, and then another. He discarded both as much too soiled, hesitated, ran to the curtained corner and returned with a clean towel.

She had hidden the flower. She extended her hand.

”Do you mind?” he asked.

”Do I object? No. You are kind.”

He took the smudged hand--took it with a hand that trembled--and bent his smudged face so close to it that she must have felt his breath beating on it, hot and quick. He made two dabs with the end of the towel.

Chitta, whom they had both sadly neglected, pounced upon them from her lair among the shadows. She seized the hand and, jabbering fifty words in the time for two, pushed Cartaret from his work.

”I'm not going to hurt anybody,” said Cartaret. ”Do, please, get away.”

The Girl laughed.

”Chitta trusts no foreigners,” she explained.

She spoke to Chitta, but Chitta, glowering at Cartaret, shook her head and grumbled.

”I do not any more desire to order her about,” said The Girl to Cartaret. ”Already this evening I have wounded her feelings, I fear.

She says she will allow none but herself to minister to me. You, sir, will forgive her? After all, it is her duty.”

Cartaret inwardly cursed Chitta's fidelity. What he said was: ”Of course.” He knew that just here he might say something gallant, and that he would think of that something an hour hence; but he could not think of it now.

The Girl touched the turpentine bottle.

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