"Have you come back to your rooms?" she asked timidly.

"I shall do so," I announced, "but I hope that it will be only for the night. To-morrow, if all goes well, we may be on our way to Norfolk."

There was a knock at the door. She started, and looked at me a little uneasily. Almost immediately the door was pushed open. It was Louis who entered, bearing a menu card. He addressed me with a little air of surprise. I was at once certain that he had known of my visit, and had come to see what it might mean.

"Monsieur has returned very soon," he remarked, bowing pleasantly.

"My journey was not a long one, Louis," I answered. "What have you brought that thing for?" I continued, pointing to the menu card. "Do you want an order for dinner? Miss Delora is dining elsewhere with me!"

My tone was purposely aggressive. Louis' manners, however, remained perfection.

"Miss Delora has engaged a table in the cafe," he said. "I have come myself to suggest a little dinner. I trust she will not disappoint us."

She looked at me pathetically. There was something which I could not understand in her face. Only I knew that whatever she might ask me I was prepared to grant.

"Will you not stay and dine here with me?" she said. "Louis will give us a very good dinner, and afterwards I shall have my message, and I shall know whether I may go or not."

The humor of the idea appealed to me. There was suddenly something fantastic, unbelievable, in the events of last night.

"With pleasure!" I answered.

Louis bowed, and for a moment or two seemed entirely engrossed in the few additions he was making to the menu he carried. Then he handed it to me with a little bow.

"There, monsieur," he said. "I think that you will find that excellent."

"I have no doubt that we shall, Louis," I answered. "I will only ask you to remember one thing."

"And that, monsieur?" he asked.

"I dine with mademoiselle," I said, "and our appet.i.tes are identical!"

Louis smiled. There were times when I suspected him of a sense of humor!

"Monsieur has not the thick neck of Bartot!" he murmured, as he withdrew.

CHAPTER XXIII

FELICIA

It seemed to me that Felicia that night was in her most charming mood. She wore a dress of some soft white material, and a large black hat, under which her face--a little paler even than usual--wore almost a pathetic aspect. Her fingers touched my arm as we entered the restaurant together. She seemed, in a way, to have lost some of her self-control,--the exclusiveness with which she had surrounded herself,--and to have become at once more natural and more girlish. I noticed that she chose a seat with her back to the room, and I understood her reason even before she told me.

"I think," she said, "that to-night it would be pleasant to forget that there is any one here who disturbs me. I think it would be pleasant to remember only that this great holiday of mine, which I have looked forward to so long, has really begun."

"You have looked forward to coming to London so much?" I asked.

"Yes!" she answered. "I have lived a very quiet life, Capitaine Rotherby. After the Sisters had finished with me--and I stayed at the school longer than any of the others--I went straight to the house of a friend of my uncle's, where I had only a _dame de compagnie_.

My uncle--he was so long coming, and the life was very dull. But always he wrote to me, 'Some day I will take you to London!' Even when we were in Paris together he would tell me that."

"Tell me," I asked, "what is your uncle's Christian name?"

"I have three uncles," she said, after a moment's hesitation,--"Maurice, Ferdinand, and Nicholas. Nicholas lives all the time in South America. Maurice and Ferdinand are often in Paris."

"And the uncle with whom you are now?" I asked.

I seemed to have been unfortunate in my choice of a conversation. Her eyes had grown larger. The quivering of her lips was almost pitiful.

"I am a clumsy a.s.s!" I interrupted quickly. "I am asking you questions which you do not wish to answer. A little later on, perhaps, you will tell me everything of your own accord. But to-night I shall ask you nothing. We will remember only that the holiday has begun."

She drew a little sigh of relief.

"You are so kind," she murmured, "so very kind. Indeed I do not want to think of these things, which I do not understand, and which only puzzle me all the time. We will let them alone, is it not so? We will let them alone and talk about foolish things. Or you shall tell me about London, and the country--tell me what we will do. Indeed, I may go down to your home in Norfolk."

"I think you will like it there," I said. "It is too stuffy for London these months. My brother's house is not far from the sea. There is a great park which stretches down to some marshes, and beyond that the sands."

"Can one bathe?" she asked breathlessly.

"Of course," I answered. "There is a private beach, and when we have people in the house at this time of the year we always have the motor-car ready to take them down and back. That is for those who bathe early. Later on it is only a pleasant walk. Then you can learn games if you like,--golf and tennis, cricket and croquet."

"I should be so stupid," she said, with a little regretful sigh. "In France they did not teach me those things. I can play tennis a little, but oh! so badly; and in England," she continued, "you think so much of your games. Tell me, Capitaine Rotherby, will you think me very stupid in the country if I can do nothing but swim a little and play tennis very badly?"

"Rather not!" I answered. "There is the motor, you know. I could take you for some delightful drives. We should find plenty to do, I am sure, and I promise you that if only you will be as amiable as you are here I shall not find any fault."

"You will like to have me there?" she asked.

Her question came with the simplicity of a child. She laughed softly with pleasure when I leaned over the table and whispered to her,--

"Better than anything else in the world!"

"I am not sure, Capitaine Rotherby," she said, looking at me out of her great eyes, "whether you are behaving nicely."

"If I am not," I declared, "it is your fault! You should not look so charming."

She laughed softly.

"And you should not make such speeches to a poor little foreign girl,"

she said, "who knows so little of your London ways."

Louis stood suddenly before us. We felt his presence like a cold shadow. The laughter died away from her eyes, and I found it difficult enough to address him civilly.

"Monsieur is well served?" he asked. "Everything all right, eh?"

"Everything is very good, as usual, Louis," I answered. "The only thing that is amiss you cannot alter."

"For example?" he asked.