"This is indeed a gala night," said Ennison, raising his glass, and
watching for a moment the golden bubbles. "Was it really only this
afternoon that I met you in St. James' Park?"
Anna nodded, and made a careful selection from a dish of quails.
"It was just an hour before teatime," she remarked. "I have had
nothing since, and it seems a very long time."
"An appetite like yours," he said resignedly, "is fatal to all
sentiment."
"Not in the least," she assured him. "I find the two inseparable."
He sighed.
"I have noticed," he said, "that you seem to delight in taking a
topsy-turvy view of life. It arises, I think, from an over developed
sense of humour. You would find things to laugh at even in Artemus
Ward."
"You do not understand me at all," she declared. "I think that you are
very dense. Besides, your remark is not in the least complimentary. I
have always understood that men avoid like the plague a woman with a
sense of humour."
So they talked on whilst supper was served, falling easily into the
spirit of the place, and yet both of them conscious of some new thing
underlying the gaiety of their tongues and manner. Anna, in her
strange striking way, was radiantly beautiful. Without a single
ornament about her neck, or hair, wearing the plainest of black gowns,
out of which her shoulders shone gleaming white, she was easily the
most noticeable and the most distinguished-looking woman in the room.
To-night there seemed to be a new brilliancy in her eyes, a deeper
quality in her tone. She was herself conscious of a recklessness of
spirits almost hysterical. Perhaps, after all, the others were right.
Perhaps she had found this new thing in life, the thing wonderful. The
terrors and anxieties of the last few months seemed to have fallen
from her, to have passed away like an ugly dream, dismissed with a
shudder even from the memory. An acute sense of living was in her
veins, even the taste of her wine seemed magical. Ennison too, always
handsome and _debonnair_, seemed transported out of his calm self. His
tongue was more ready, his wit more keen than usual. He said daring
things with a grace which made them irresistible, his eyes flashed
back upon her some eloquent but silent appreciation of the change in
her manner towards him.
And then there came for both of them at least a temporary awakening.
It was he who saw them first coming down the room--Annabel in a
wonderful white satin gown in front, and Sir John stiff, unbending,
disapproving, bringing up the rear. He bent over to Anna at once.
"It is your sister and her husband," he said. "They are coming past
our table."
Annabel saw Ennison first, and noticing his single companion calmly
ignored him. Then making a pretence of stooping to rearrange her
flowing train, she glanced at Anna, and half stopped in her progress
down the room. Sir John followed her gaze, and also saw them. His face
clouded with anger.