"But Caryll will never believe what he says," the d.u.c.h.ess offered comfortingly. "Men never do."

As she spoke the doors slid apart and the six men straggled in in procession, scattering slowly like a flock of settling birds. Each married man tried to avoid his wife and rather missed the mark.

Caryll Carleigh walked to where Mrs. Darling sat, circled her and took the other end of the red tufted thing that was made for two. She just smiled.

All the rest began to talk at once. The air warmed with: "They made it a point to drive through once a year and preserve the right of way--" "He said: 'Don't hurry!' but she took it and the branch caught her and carried her off--" "Oh, no, it wasn't that winter; it was when I was in Malta--" and so on, and so on.

Sir Caryll lifted his eyes and lowered his voice. "Do you know, I was sure my heart was dead. I was certain of it. But now I begin to doubt."

She smiled still, staring straight before her.

"Do look at me," he pleaded. "Your eyes are so wonderful. Like an elixir. They give me back all that I have lost. Do look at me."

"Do you know," she asked, complying with his request, "that I'm considered a very bad woman?"

"I don't believe it."

"Oh, but I am. You ask Lord Kneedrock. He'll tell you. He has a hash about a reincarnated tiger that he tells every one. He calls my hands claws."

She looked down at her hands then and Caryll's gaze followed hers. They were wonderful hands, every finger a psychic index.

"Some day I'll let you hold one for a little," she said, moving them slightly. "You can judge for yourself what they're like then."

He was conscious of the most curious of thrills. It coursed through him from head to toes. It stimulated him, wonderfully. It redoubled his courage.

"Adieu, ordinary rules!" his heart cried. "To the front and fire!" And his voice said: "Has Kneedrock ever held them?"

"Oh, yes. Ever so many have. I'm making a study of holding hands. Some men keep boring into your palm with their thumb, and some like to grind all your knuckle-bones together, crosswise. They never seem to think how the woman may feel."

"I fancy, under such circ.u.mstances, if I were you, I should say something," said Sir Caryll, laughing.

She looked at him, seriously. "What, for instance?"

"'Oh, you hurt! Let go!'"

"I'll try to remember," she said, without a smile. "You think that is better than just bearing it?"

"Yes. Unless you like it."

"Oh, I never like it. I grew weary of it long ago. Men are all so dreadfully alike. Unless you are going to be different, I--Are you going to be different?"

"I'm heart-broken," said Carleigh, not quite seriously. "Perhaps that const.i.tutes a difference."

"I know exactly how it feels to be heart-broken." She nodded wisely.

"You feel that it will kill you; but it doesn't. The third day one takes pudding, as usual."

"Tell me," he pleaded suddenly, "did you love your husband?"

"Oh, no," she answered with emphasis. "What a stupid question!"

"What went on before he died?"

She laughed. "Lots," was her laconic answer.

"Were you very lonely?"

"No. I had compensation."

He felt a violent throb through all his veins.

"A lover?" he asked boldly.

Instantly her eyes came to his. "You really do think bad of me, then?"

Her tone was reproachful. "You think that when I said people considered me a very bad woman they meant baddest bad, and that they considered right?"

"No," he corrected. "I didn't stop to think. What I said just jumped into my head. I'm curious about you--that's all."

"I'm not going to tell you my story," she declared. "You ask Kneedrock.

He'll tell you that I shot my husband to marry another man, and that the other man begged to be excused. Kneedrock's very entertaining when he begins to be confidential about me."

"How can you joke about such things?"

"I joke about everything. It's my way of getting on."

"But such an awful tale!"

"Oh, dreadful!" she said, easily.

He felt a bit uncertain and his laugh showed it. "The other man was an idiot," he told her.

"Quite so," she a.s.sented.

There was a movement among the others. They were going to have bridge.

All had risen and their backs were turned. Quickly he laid his hand upon hers. Then:

"Oh, how you interest me!" he exclaimed, below his breath. "You've had a bad time, too. I know it. I feel it. You'll tell me, and I'll tell you, and there'll be something in the world I'll care about again. You see, I thought--I really was sure--that all the caring about things had been killed in me forever."

Her hand was quiet beneath the throbbing of his own. He had a singular hand for a man--one of those rare hands that pale and flush, that shiver and burn.

It burned now, but hers had no responding heat or throb. If his quivered with a pa.s.sionate call for some response, the response came not. He had to recognize that no sleeping ardor stirred to the call of his caress.

But her eyelids drooped lower and lower until her lashes lay close against her cheeks, and then as he looked--and longed--he saw suddenly with an ecstatic thrill of surprise and delight that tears shone among them.

"You feel--something?" he murmured breathlessly. "What?"

"I feel for you," she answered. "You are so young. How old are you? Do you mind telling me?"

Certainly he had not expected that answer. "I am twenty-six," he said.