Part 19 (1/2)
She laughed softly.
”How foolish you are!”
”It is good to be foolish at the right time, and with the right person!
Wisdom is the death's-head at the feast of life. But we are going to shut her outside the door for a whole week--you and I.”
The strangely sweet magic of those linked p.r.o.nouns stirred Elsie as never before; though the sound of them had pleased her once, not a little, on the lips of Kenneth Malcolm. Bud she answered lightly, as women will, when they feel barriers giving way.
”I never knew I had agreed to anything so desperate!”
He had laid his arm along the back of the seat; so that his hand was within an inch of her shoulder. He moved it closer.
”You have done more than that without knowing it--_pet.i.te amie_,” he said, yielding himself, as always, to the witchery of the moment. ”It is your doing that I have achieved an inspired picture. It is your doing that I want this week in Arcadia to be an idyll we shall neither of us forget--an idyll of sunlight, moons.h.i.+ne, and blessed freedom from _les convenances_. No past--no future--only the present; and in it two spirits tuned to one key. That is the secret of perfect enjoyment.”
She shook her head.
”I don't quite understand. It sounds too fantastic. The past and the future are there always. One can't get rid of them.”
”But one can shut the door on them when they threaten to disturb the present, which is the great reality after all.”
”Can one? You seem to have a talent for shutting doors!”
”A convenient talent; worth cultivating! You may take my word for it.”
Something in the statement or its manner of utterance jarred, ever so slightly,--threatened to break the charm that held her.
”Dangerously convenient,” she murmured, in gentle reproof.
”Little Puritan! What a narrow track you walk upon. Hardly room on it for two abreast. Is there?”
The last words were almost a whisper. He pressed nearer, bringing his face close to hers. At the same moment she felt a light touch on her shoulder, and drawing back to escape the disturbing eloquence of his eyes, she discovered the presence of his encircling arm. The discovery brought her to her feet--flushed, palpitating, aquiver with anger at this first shadow of insult to her maidenhood.
”Will you take me in again, please?” she said quietly, and the request savoured of command. For her gentle nature was founded on a rock; and a very little below the unresisting surface one came upon adamant, pure and simple. But the unabashed Frenchman caught one of her hands, and crushed it against his lips.
”_Pet.i.te amie_--forgive me! I was overbold. I am not fit to touch the hem of your dress. But one is only flesh and blood; and you . . . say you are not angry with me, in your heart . . . .”
She drew her hand away decisively; and with unconscious cruelty rubbed the back of it against her dress, as if to remove a stain.
”I am angry--I have a right to be angry,” she answered in the same toneless voice. ”And if you will not come in with me, I shall go alone.”
He rose then; and they crossed the enchanted courtyard together--a clear foot of s.p.a.ce between them.
The brilliance of the Durbar Hall smote the girl painfully. It was as though the light had power to penetrate and reveal her hidden perturbation. Without looking up, she felt her mother's eyes upon her; and the wild-rose tint of her cheeks deepened under their scrutiny.
But she avoided meeting them, and, going straight to her father, slipped a small hand under his arm. She felt indefinably in need of protection, not only from the man, whose kiss had moved her more than he guessed, but from herself, and the new emotions quickening at her heart; and in all times of trouble she turned spontaneously to her father. He was the true parent of her spirit; and, but for the matter-of-fact, half-condescending devotion of three boys at home, Mrs Mayhew might, at times, have felt left out in the cold.
”Enjoying yourself, little girl?” the father asked, smiling down at her.