"And pray, who are you to please, sir?" she asked in quick displeasure. "You speak of presumption in others, Mr. Renault, and, unsolicited, you offer an affront to me and to a gentleman who is not here to answer."
"I wish he were," I said between my teeth.
Her fair face hardened.
"Wishes are very safe, sir," she said in a low voice.
At that, suddenly, such a blind anger flooded me that the setting sun swam in my eyes and the blood dinned in ears and brain as though to burst them. At such moments, which are rare with me, I fall silent; and so I stood, while the strange rage shook me, and passed, leaving me cold and very quiet.
"I think we had best go," I said.
She held out her hand. I aided her to rise; and she kept my hand in hers, laying the other over it, and looked up into my eyes.
"Forgive me, Carus," she whispered. "No man can be more gallant and more sweet than you."
"Forgive me, Elsin. No maid so generous and just as you."
And that was all, for we crossed the street, and I mounted the stoop of our house with her, and bowed her in when the great door opened.
"Are you not coming in?" she asked, lingering in the doorway.
"No. I shall take the air."
"But we sup in a few moments."
"I may sup at the Coq d'Or," I said. Still she stood there, the wind blowing through the doorway fluttering the pink bows tied under her chin--a sweet, wistful face turned up to mine, and the early candle-light from the hall sconces painting one rounded cheek with golden lusters.
"Have you freely forgiven me, Carus?"
"Yes, freely. You know it."
"And you will be at the Fort? I shall give you that dance you ask to-night, shall I not?"
"If you will."
There was a silence; she stretched out one hand. Then the door was closed and I descended the steps once more, setting my hat on my head and tucking my walking-stick under one arm, prepared to meet my drover friend, who, Ennis said, desired to speak with me.
But I had no need to walk out along Great George Street to find my bird; for, as I left Wall Street and swung the corner into Broadway, the husky, impatient whisper of a whippoorwill broke out from the dusk among the ruins of Trinity, and I started and turned, crossing the street. Wild birds there were a-plenty in the city, yet the whippoorwill so seldom came into the streets that the note alone would have attracted me had Ennis not warned me of the signal.