How deliciously shy she was! Remembered hearing Pugsley say they are often that way with the development of love. Told me he thought he'd get married once--looked over the girls of his set and picked out one; then he went to see her. She was devilish cordial at first and until Pugsley began to tell her about it, then she began to grow agitated--finally went out of the room and had hysterics. _Next_ time he saw her she hardly was able to speak to him! Said that ended it and he pa.s.sed her up--too dashed much bother trying to follow 'em, he decided; they were too high-strung, too emotional, too uncertain of themselves, _he_ thought.

I gave her five seconds, and then--

"You don't _know_?" I repeated with gentle reproach. "Oh, I say, you know! You know you _know_ you know!" By Jove, that sounded rather rum, but I knew she knew I knew she _knew_--see?

She looked at me sidewise, her slender forefinger pressing the half-parted lips slowly shaping in a curve. Then her little teeth flashed, jewel-like--regular jolly pearl setting in the frankest, sweetest smile!--and then her glorious arm and wrist arched suddenly toward me.

"Yes!" she said contritely, and with the most delightful, kindest inflection and laugh--such a laugh!--a laugh gurglingly melodious--oh, dash it, yes; I mean just that!--like the flute notes in the overture to what's-his-name--_that_ sort!

"That's the way I love to hear a man talk!" she said warmly. "I think it takes an American to stand up for his own place, his own times--_please_!"

And gently, but with a lovely smile, she withdrew her hand that I had folded close in mine. I let it go, for I saw her look toward the house, and, of course, _I_ understood--jolly careless of me not to have remembered--but she would know from my nod and shrug that I comprehended.

And really, by Jove, it was almost as pleasant as holding her hand, just to watch her leaning back against the iron pillar about which curved the dark-leaved tendrils of some purple-flowering vine. By Jove, she just looked like a stunning, white, Easter-card angel--that's what!--even to the golden hair they always have and the jolly wings; for her gleaming arms, spread behind her head, made you think of that. But _that_ was as near as one of them could come to her, for no golden-haired angel in white flowing nightgown was ever a patch on her for _style_!

Never a one could look so _chic_ as she did in her smart linen suit, with its blue flannel collar, caught low with a flowing, breezy tie; and no jolly angel _I_ ever saw pictured could sport a waist like that, so dainty, so modish, so jolly snug and--er--squeezable, don't you know--_never_! And I was devilish sure that no barefooted or sandaled angel would ever dare to put a foot beside one of those little white Oxfords or that arching instep, just blushing faintly through the silken mesh that held it--well, I guess not! And where the angel, I should like to know, that could match her glorious, fluffy pompadour or the distracting little golden smoke wisps that whirled and pulled and tangled and tossed and twisted and tugged, trying to lift her in their feeble arms into the current of the wandering breeze?

I sighed, and my deep breath brought her gaze back to me and her flashing smile as well.

"And so," she said, lifting her little chin, "you think there are just as many knights now as there used to be?"

I almost laughed at the child-like question--but I didn't! Dash it, no, I wouldn't have done so for the world. Just looked at her seriously and answered her in kind:

"Perfectly sure of it, don't you know!"

And, by Jove, I was! Knew if there had been any change, some newspaper-reading chap at the club would have mentioned it--_that_ was safe: especially one silly a.s.s who was always reading of some jolly comet that was coming. _He_ would know about the nights.

"Yes--oh, yes, there are just as many," I affirmed positively, and added quickly: "_More_, you know!" For suddenly I remembered it was leap-year, and I knew there was some jolly rhyme about leap-year gives us one day more--so, of course, there'd be another _night_!

"You don't know how glad I am to hear you say that," she said musingly.

"There are just as many knights, you mean, but the conditions have changed--the _man_ is changed--is that it?"

I should say the man was changed! "Oh, dash it, yes!" I blurted. By Jove, I hoped there wouldn't be another change.

"You mean"--with a little, challenging, puzzled smile, she leaned forward, her elbow resting upon her knee like a sculptured, Grecian pillar; her flower-like curving fingers supporting her chin like a Corinthian what's-its-name, you know, the sort of thing the ancient what-you-call-'ems always added to top off their stunning marble columns--_you_ know!--well, like that--"you mean we may find knights, not only in the field, but in the shops, upon the streets--even in the slums; or in the hospitals, in the church or even on the bench--_that_ is your idea?"

It _wasn't_ my idea at all--I should say not! Who wanted to spend nights prowling around _that_ way? Why--why, it wasn't respectable, dash it!

Besides, that sort of thing--excursioning about seeing things--was devilish tiresome, if you asked me. I never did do it, even abroad, where you meet Americans, jolly bored and tired, doing all sorts of rum places no one else ever thinks of, don't you know.

And as for a _bench_! Well, it was like her, in her innocence of the world, not to know how downright vulgar that would be. I had seen couples sitting evenings in the park--and I _knew_!

But I answered tactfully:

"I don't mean those places so much, don't you know--I think we can find lots jollier and better nights elsewhere." And I closed my free eye and beamed at her through my gla.s.s. "Don't have to go so far, you know; under one's own roof, or--er--some one else's roof, for instance--why not _here_?" I jerked my head toward the old stone pile behind us.

"Oh!"--her eyebrows lifted at me--"so you've thought of that, too?"--she nodded gravely--"you mean in the library there?"

I winked a.s.sent.

The library suited _me_ all right!

"Just now," she said in an oddly sobered voice, "I looked in as I pa.s.sed through, and he was looking so crushed, so worn and tired, you know--he had just come from up-stairs; and yet he faced me so bravely and smilingly"--she shook her head--"poor fellow!"

I stared--puzzled, don't you know. Offhand, dash me if I could see what the judge had to do with our evenings together--why, I had his own approval of my suit. Then I remembered that she, of course, didn't know that--_yet_. Probably what she had in her dear little mind was that he might be holding the library--and he _would_, if he continued to think he was busy; for I had heard him say he expected to work all night. But then, there were dozens and dozens of others places we could go--well, I should just _say_!

I had just bent forward to suggest this to her when I saw she was going to speak. So I waited, smiling at her tenderly.

"And about Arthur--" she began, and I cut myself a painful stab with my nails--right in the palm--"now there is a case where I think you find"--she nodded toward the house again--"where you find one of his superb qualities, the one quality that, of all, I admire in a man the most."

"By Jove!" I said, leaning forward. I wondered what it was--and then, dash it, I asked her.

"Just _trust_!" she said simply, and her face grew luminous. "Faith, perhaps I should say. _My_ father has it larger than any man I ever knew; it is something that goes out from him with his friendship, with his love, making a dual gift"--her voice dropped thoughtfully--"I have studied it in him all my life, and it has always seemed so beautiful to me--so wonderful--the unquestioning peace he has"--her blue eyes widened, shining--"has ever in return for the perfect, abiding trust that he gives to the thing he calls his own. I _know_, for he has made _me_ feel it from the time I was a tiny little girl!" The last word was almost a whisper, so tense, so vibrant with feeling was it--she _seemed_ to have forgotten my existence. "And if ever I find a man--" she breathed.

I coughed slightly and she started, stared at me--and then the dimple deepened in her cheek, lost in a bed of jolly roses. Her laughter pealed forth, birdlike--delicious!

"I _beg_ your pardon!" she said. "But when I think of papa and of how he believes in his children, especially poor little _me_, I think I must get--" Her roguish, puzzled smile searched my face. "_How_ is it you say it?--oh, I know--'I think I must be getting _dippy_!'"

And it was the first slang I had heard from those sweet lips since the night she was in my rooms!

CHAPTER XXIX

"BECAUSE YOU--ARE YOU"

Poor, brave-hearted girl! How pitiful and heartrending to a keen-eyed man of the world, seemed her poor, little sham about her father's trust in her! For _I_ knew the facts, you know!

What a little thoroughbred she was! By Jove, I just sat there for a full two minutes, bending toward her worshipfully, but with such a lump choking my devilish throat that dash me if I could chirp a single word.

Just sat there--that's all--blinking damply at her with my free eye, studying with growing wonder the light she managed to summon to her face; heartsick for the care-free mockery of the cherry lips, shaping seemingly in a meditative whistle; all my jolly heart beating time to the lithesome tapping of her smart little boot upon the wooden floor.

And she? She, brave heart, leaning back watching me through her long, fringing lashes--forcing a quizzical smile to her face, the while the jolly worm was gnawing at her what-you-call-'ems!

And suddenly it came to me that I just couldn't and wouldn't let her go on this way, without the sympathy of the man she loved; without the precious consolation of knowing that he knew! She was being badgered and rough-shouldered and put upon and distrusted and maligned by every one she knew, and she had _no_ one in all the world to turn to but me--and--

Oh, I wanted her to know what _I_ thought, don't you know!

I slipped to the seat beside her.

"Er, Miss Billings--" I began, thinking absentmindedly of what I should say, and forgetting that we were quite alone.

"'Miss Billings!' _Why_ do you call me that?" Her lovely brows puckered.

"I remember, now, that's twice you--"

"_Frances_, then!" I corrected softly.

She straightened, her bosom lifting with a quick intake. By Jove, that was what she wanted!

"Oh!" Then she leaned slowly back, looking at me thoughtfully through half-closed eyes, her lips parted in the oddest smile.