Men of Affairs Part 19

"No. Nothing." But again she raised her head.

"I say, are you sure you're all right?" he asked.

"Yes, perfectly."

"'Cause if I can get you anything----"

"You can hardly expect me to be normal," she retorted with a flash of bitterness.

It was difficult to know what to say, so he nodded understandingly. An inspiration suggested the offer of a cigarette, but she shook her head.

"I prefer my own," she said, and drew a gold case from her bag. "Try one."

He took the case and she nodded toward it.

"I still carry your gifts."

Richard turned it over and read the inscription "Auriole Craven from A.B." It was a stroke of luck to get her name without asking. He smiled and handed it back with the words,

"Ungallant of me to expose your ident.i.ty and conceal my own behind initials."

Auriole laughed shortly.

"Perhaps A. B. guessed that a day might come when his name engraved on a present to another woman would be a mistake."

"Give him a chance," said Richard. "He hasn't all that subtlety."

"Men change their views very readily, Tony."

"Only men?" he countered.

She jerked the reply at him over her uncovered shoulder.

"My being here, you mean? My having joined the other side?"

This was a grateful piece of intelligence but Richard preserved a stern expression.

"Since you suggest it yourself----" he admitted.

"Do you hate me for doing it?"

He shrugged his shoulders.

"Not at all. I'm sure your reasons were adequate."

"They were. Still I thought you'd be surprised."

It was clearly evident that some sort of emotion would have to be expressed. Richard pa.s.sed a hand across his forehead and walked to the fireplace.

"My dear Auriole," he said, "did I ever strike you as a man who betrayed my real feelings?"

"I always knew them," she returned.

"Then you must know how hurt I am--how very hurt--to think that you--well, I mean, it's dreadful--most--er--most dreadful."

"Were you expecting loyalty from me?"

"There are degrees," he replied with a reproachful glance.

"Wonderful," said Auriole. "It's wonderful really." Her voice dropped and she looked him squarely in the eyes. "Tony, you're not really in love with that girl, you know."

He was concealing bewilderment behind the action of mixing a drink, but the statement so startled him that he sent a column of soda water straight into his shoe.

"Look here," he declared, vigorously mopping his sock with a handkerchief. "If you're going to say things like that I simply----"

"You can't love her."

A tinge of scarlet showed upon her white cheeks. Evidently the girl was in earnest. It was useless to flirt with the situation.

"I am not going to attempt to prove it," said Richard very gallantly.

"In fact it's an offence for me to mention her name."

"You haven't--yet," he observed tentatively.

And as she took this to be a challenge, she leaned back in her chair and said "Isabel Irish" with very little charity of inflexion.

"Please!" said Richard--but what he really meant was "Thank you."

Inside himself he was thinking "d.a.m.n that fellow Doran! Why the blazes didn't he tell me about all these girls."

The sound of Auriole's voice brought him back to the necessity of the moment.

"So _sans gene_," she was saying, "so innocent--so unworldly. I wonder what her views would be if she learnt you had entertained a lady in your flat at midnight."

"As the lady came uninvited," Richard returned, "I am hardly likely to refer to the matter."

"Suppose I referred to it--advertised the fact. Do you imagine she would marry you then?"

Richard smiled.

"I should say she'd be as likely to marry me then as she is now."

"A girl brought up as she has been?"

"Aha!"

"You're very confident. Tony, there are people watching this flat to-night."