tomb, but they were never my favorite flowers."
"No," she said, "it is not true. My heart is here"--she touched the
place--"it is large--and I am, oh, very, very kind."
"You are rather adorable, you know," said his abrupt voice. "Here is
your coat."
She was warm to the eye, animating, of an exquisite figure. Her nearness
released a faint fragrance. She slipped her left arm into the sleeve he
offered, and looking up at him, half over her shoulder, said with a
mocking little laugh:
"And _you_ know that kind-hearted girls are always awfully credulous....
I sweep you off your feet. My eyes _intoxicate_ you, drive you _mad!_ Go
on. I've told you that I like your pretty speeches."
"I do not always stop with speeches--you wild, sweet thing...."
So Mr. Canning; and with that speech he did in fact stop most abruptly,
and at once turned a step away. In the sharp brief silence, Carlisle put
on her other sleeve for herself.
From the hall, almost at the door, it seemed, had sounded the brisk
approaching voices of Mrs. Heth and Kerr; presumably also of Johnson.
Destiny, having had its way with their absence, was returning them upon
the dot. In the sitting-room, talk of such matters as Miss Heth's wild
sweetness necessarily came to a sudden conclusion.
The big man lounged with folded arms. His look was slightly annoyed.
"One more beginning, and you have your way again, after all! This
becomes a habit," said he, with his faint ironic note. "Miss Heth, I am
as you say quite dull and safe: the dullest of all creatures, a play
valetudinarian, bored to ill-manners at times, as you have observed, by
large overdoses of my own society. Could you take pity on me? Could you
and Mrs. Heth give me the pleasure of dining with me, and Kerr, at the
Arlington, perhaps,--or wherever else you may prefer,--on the first
evening you can spare for deeds of mercy?"
Carlisle looked at him, buttoning her glove. Her lips smiled; but in
truth she was a little unsteadied by the exciting moment just passed
through, by the buoyant sense of triumph welling up within her. Were not
|