“Aren’t you leaving love out of the question?” ventured Athalia.
“I don’t think so. I know love jettisons fear, but I don’t think it
sandbags the instinct of self-preservation. I don’t mean that if you
tottered into a bear-pit I wouldn’t go in to get you out. But if you
dropped your lip-stick in—well, the bears could have it.”
“Supposing it was the only lip-stick I had?”
“Nothing doing,” said Fairfax.
“Supposing I said that if you got it out I’ld marry you?”
“Love doesn’t——”
“Don’t evade,” said Miss Choate. “There’s another ten minutes to go.”
Fairfax looked at her.
Silhouetted against the black of an old bureau, the delicate features
looked especially beautiful. The smooth brow, the straight clean-cut
nose, the sweet droop of the mouth—from temples to pert chin my lady’s
face was a picture for men to kneel to.
Her squire covered his eyes.
“Rot it,” he said shakily. “I—I believe I should have a dart.”
Athalia permitted herself to smile.
“But if I was poor you wouldn’t?”
“No. For both our sakes. . . . Yes—I’m honest. For both. We’re earthy,
you know. It’ld mean that we’ld have to come down—come down in the
world. Well, I shouldn’t like that—I’ld hate it. And so would you. And
on the top of it all I should always know two things—first, that I’d
brought you down, and then that you might have married a richer man.”
“How would you bring me down if I was poor?”
“My dear, your face is your fortune—your face and your pretty ways. You
might be poor as blazes, but as long as you stayed single you could dine
and dance and sleep in half the ancestral homes of England.”
“Sort of second Queen Elizabeth?” said Athalia. “I must be nice.”
“Oh, but you are,” said Punch. “Most—er—most nice.”
“D’you mind speaking the truth?”
Fairfax moistened his lips.
“You are probably the most adorable woman in London to-day. I have never
heard anything said of you which you would not have liked to hear.
Finally, you are frequently indicated as a future Duchess: in fact, if
you married me, I believe sterling would drop two stitches—I mean,
points.”
“I wish I was poor,” said Miss Choate.
“What would you do?”
Again the lady smiled.
“I should probably marry you,” she said.
“But I shouldn’t ’ve asked——”
“I should waive that preliminary,” said Miss Choate calmly.