I
"I love you," said Michael Lanyard.
He spoke in French; and that simple phrase, covered by the surging song
of strings and woodwinds, was inaudible to other ears. Only the woman
with him heard and, hearing, roused from the reverie into which she too
insensibly had lapsed, turning back from the prismatic pageantry of the
dance eyes whose grave regard gave never a clue to the emotions his
words inspired.
Making no more acknowledgment than this, she studied him intently but
kindly, touched by the wistfulness that shadowed the demeanour of
unpretending dignity which she had learned to like best of all the many
phases of the man their friendship had revealed.
The severity of evening dress in line and lack of colour became him
well, setting off the lean, sculptured contours of his face, giving
value to its even warmth of tone. Traces of silver at his temples hinted
at that history, not too happy, with which she was in part acquainted.
The strength with which his mouth was modelled affected her, as always,
with a faint, strangely pleasant thrill of alarm, the dark, clear eyes,
at once deferential and demanding, held her in a spell she had no wish
to break.
"I love you," he repeated.
Her brows took on a quaintly plaintive cast. "I know, my friend," she
replied in the same tongue and tone. "For a long time I have known . . .
as you have known my love was all for you. And yet . . ." The slender
shoulders lifting their fairness out of the corsage of her jetted gown
sketched a shrug.
"I had to wait to tell you," he said, "till I was sure--"