"I thought you said you were lunching with Sa.s.soon," he said suspiciously.

"I am. What of it?--or don't you dare?"

He looked at her fixedly, divining her reason.

"I warned you to beware of me," she said demurely. "I love scenes--dramatic temperament, you know. Think how furious Sa.s.soon will be! Well?"

"What time?" he said, with a snap of his jaws.

"Oh, half past two."

"I'll come!"

CHAPTER XII

Tony Rex descended to place them in their automobile. He was a short youth in loose pepper-and-salt clothes, with a pointed nose and a quant.i.ty of tow hair tumbling over a freckled forehead. Dore hardly noticed him. Not so Ida, who, in true Salamander fashion, had already established a permanent intimacy.

"Why did you desert me?" said Dore, with hypocritical severity, when they had left their escort, hat in hand, on the curb.

"My dear, I couldn't help it!" said Ida volubly. "I was having such a wonderful party with Mr. Rex. My dear, I'm crazy about him! Did you ever see those funny little cartoons of his? Screams! Just think of it, he comes from almost the same place I do! We've made a date for to-morrow.

Lord! I do like some one who talks English you can understand!"

Dore, impatient to be home, fed her with rapture-inciting questions and retired into her own speculations. Chance had played her a trick. She had had no intention of keeping her appointment with Sa.s.soon; but now the dramatic possibilities of a clash between her host and Harrigan Blood, which had risen out of a light answer, had so whetted her curiosity that she found herself in sudden perplexity. Her encounter with Blood had awakened in her all the mischievous, danger-seeking enthusiasms. They had scarcely pa.s.sed half an hour, and yet he had left her breathless at his breakneck pace, the abrupt charge of his attack, his unconventionality, his stripping away of artifices. He had interested her more than she had foreseen.

Yesterday how her eyes would have sparkled with delight at having inveigled such a thrashing fish into her cunning nets! And even now it was hard to forego the excitement of such a game. Her dramatic self, once aroused by the tete-a-tete, was not easily subdued. After all, too easy a compliance with Ma.s.singale's ideas, too patient a waiting for his summons, was dangerous. Better to teach him how sought after was the prize. Besides, if she kept him waiting until the evening, she could tell by the first glance of his eyes how much he had suffered, how much he cared. She did not doubt in the least that, when she reached Miss Pim's, there on the mahogany hall table she would find his note; and blowing hot and cold, she ended up by saying to herself that if in that letter were things that could make her close her eyes with delight, she might possibly, on a mad impulse, go flying off to him. Only, it would depend; there would have to be things in that letter--

When, at last, she went tumultuously into the boarding-house, she ran through the heap of letters twice fruitlessly.

"It came by messenger; Josephus must have taken it up-stairs," she thought.

She ran up breathlessly, anxious and yet afraid, flinging open the door, gazing blankly at the floor, then ransacking rapidly the table, the bureau-tops, the mantelpiece. Nothing had come--he had not written!

She sat down furiously. She could not comprehend! On the table a great bouquet of orchids, with "Pouffe" in golden letters on the purple ribbon, was waiting. She saw it heedlessly.

He had not written! Why? She could not understand--could find no explanation. How could any one be so thoughtless, so cruel?

"I will telephone him myself!" she thought angrily, springing up.

She went to the door precipitately, before she could control herself.

Then she stopped, wringing her hands, shaking her head. Perhaps he had come in person. She rang for Josephus. Had any one called? Had there been a message? None. Perhaps he had telephoned, and Winona had made a note of it. She went hastily to the pad where such notes were jotted down. But the page, to her dismay, was blank. She sat down quietly, folding her arms across her breast, gazing out of the window. All at once she bounded up, went rapidly down the hall, and entered Ida Summers' room.

"Come on. You're lunching with me. No excuses!"

"Where? With whom?"

"Doesn't matter--come! I'll tell you later!"

"Good heavens! what's the matter, Do?"

"Nothing! I'm a fool--I don't know. Only let's get out!"

Yes, she was a fool! The explanation was obvious! While she had been soaring with her dreams, he had gone quietly about his day. What had set her in a whirl had meant nothing to him--nothing at all! And for the moment, forgetting what had happened, forgetting how he had at the last returned, seeking admittance, she said to herself bitterly that she must have gone mad to imagine for an instant that there had been anything more than a moment's amus.e.m.e.nt between Judge Ma.s.singale and a crazy little fool living in the third floor front of a cheap boarding-house.

"Now to do as I please," she said recklessly. "We'll see if I'm of so little consequence. Sa.s.soon and Blood shall pay for this!"

Ida Summers, overwhelmed at the prospect of meeting Alfred Edward Sa.s.soon, was excitedly clamoring:

"But, Do, heavens! Give me a pointer; I'll never be able to say a word to a swell like that! What do you talk about?"

"Anything!" said Dore savagely. "What does he care what you talk about!

Or any of them! Look him in the eyes, smile, flirt! Did you ever flirt with a butcher's boy?"

"Heavens! Dodo!"

"Well, I did! They're all the same!"

"What's happened?"

Dore shrugged her shoulders. But by the time they had drawn up in front of Tenafly's she had regained her calm in a dangerous coldness bent on mischief.

Sa.s.soon came up softly, looking questions at this unexpected presentation of a third.

"I thought you would be more comfortable in public this way, instead of tete-a-tete," said Dore briefly, making the introduction. "You see how considerate I am!"

"Delighted, of course," said Sa.s.soon, in his low unvarying tones. "Don't you think we'd be better up-stairs?"

"I said in the restaurant," answered Dore peremptorily.

Sa.s.soon bowed, signaled a waiter, and led the way. She had gone hardly twenty steps into the chattering curious room, which stared at this public spectacle of Sa.s.soon, when her eye fell on the figure of Judge Ma.s.singale. Their eyes met. She felt a sudden burning shame there before every one, wavered, and went hurriedly to her seat.

He had seen her! What would he think? Would he misunderstand her at seeing her thus publicly flaunted by Sa.s.soon? What awful conclusions might not come into his mind at this persistent d.o.g.g.i.ng of her steps?

And after what had happened last night, with the memory of her blind clinging to him, the soft confession of her voice, what would he think now? Let him think what he wished, so long as he should suffer a little!

If he were here, he could have come to her! If he were so mechanical, she would teach him jealousy.

[Ill.u.s.tration: What would he think?]

But these thoughts, timorous, elated, determined, expectant, were not clearly defined to her. She had a sensation of fleeting emotions, utterly uncontrolled. She began to chat rapidly without saying anything at all, seeking in the arrangement of the mirrors a favorable angle.

At last she saw his table, and the direct confrontation of his stare. He was with a large party, mixed, a dozen at the least, and he was still looking in her direction.

"I don't care if he is furious," she thought defiantly. "If he is furious, he cares! I shall see him--talk to him. He'll make an excuse!"

She did not cease talking, but she did not hear a word she said or notice what Sa.s.soon replied. She thought Ida was making grammatical errors in her excessive efforts to give the conversation dignity, and from the bored nervous way in which Sa.s.soon was listening, she divined his fury at being thus circ.u.mvented. This pleased her. She wanted to be sure that Ma.s.singale could be jealous, but, in some confused way, she wanted Sa.s.soon to be punished.

All at once in the mirror she saw Ma.s.singale rise to take his leave. In another moment, surely, he would turn as he came toward them. She would see him, talk to him, look into his eyes. She began hurriedly, frantically, laughing at nothing, to run from topic to topic, gesturing to attract her own eyes to the table, so that he might not perceive her agitation or know the sinking of her heart as she felt him nearer and nearer.

He was there, almost at her back, coming to her. In a moment she would hear his voice, that deep controlled tone, speaking her name. She was sure now that she was blushing, that her sparkling eyes betrayed her, that Sa.s.soon, Ida surely, had guessed her agitation. But she did not care! She felt only an exquisite happiness, a bodily glow. And all at once she saw that he had pa.s.sed without even an attempt to catch her eye. He was in the doorway, and he was gone!