Part 66 (1/2)
”I'll do it NOW,” said Esme, and the bird, with a triumphant chirp of congratulation, swooped off to tell the news to the world of wings and flowers.
To the consequent interview there was no witness. So it may best be chronicled in the report made by the interviewer to her friend Mrs.
Festus Willard, who, in the cool seclusion of her sewing-room, was overwhelmed by a rush of Esme to the heart, as she put it. Not having been apprised of Miss Elliot's conflicting emotions since her departure, Mrs. Willard's mind was as a page blank for impressions when her visitor burst in upon her, pirouetted around the room, appropriated the softest corner of the divan, and announced spiritedly:
”You needn't ask me where I've been, for I won't tell you; or what I've been doing, for it's my own affair; anyway, you wouldn't be interested.
And if you insist on knowing, I've been revisiting the pale glimpses of the moon--at three o'clock P.M.”
”What do you mean, moon?” inquired Mrs. Willard, unconsciously falling into a pit of slang.
”The moon we all cry for and don't get. In this case a haughty young editor.”
”You've been to see Hal Surtaine,” deduced Mrs. Willard.
”You have guessed it--with considerable aid and a.s.sistance.”
”What for?”
”On a matter of journalistic import,” said Miss Elliot solemnly.
”But you don't cry for Hal Surtaine,” objected her friend, reverting to the lunar metaphor.
”Don't I? I'd have cried--I'd have burst into a perfect storm of tears--for him--or you--or anybody who so much as pointed a finger at me, I was so scared.”
”Scared? You! I don't believe it.”
”I don't believe it myself--now,” confessed Esme, candidly. ”But it felt most extremely like it at the time.”
”You know I don't at all approve of--”
”Of me. I know you don't, Jinny. Neither does he.”
”What did you do to him?”
”Me? I cooed at him like a dove of peace.
”But he was very stiff and proud He said, 'You needn't talk so loud,'”
chanted Miss Esme mellifluously.
”He didn't!”
”Well, if he didn't, he meant it. He wanted to know what the big, big D-e-v, dev, I was doing there, anyway.”
”Norrie Elliot! Tell me the truth.”
”Very well,” said Miss Elliot, aggrieved. ”_You_ report the conversation, then, since you won't accept my version.”
”If you would give me a start--”
”Just what he wouldn't do for me,” interrupted Esme. ”I went in there to explain something and he pointed the finger of scorn at me and accused me of frequenting low and disreputable localities.”
”Norrie!”