William Albert came out of a reverie with obvious reluctance.
"Twenty-four--just one year older than I am. But then she hasn't any
age. She's the spirit of all the Dryads that ever were; she's all
youth and yet she has the wisdom of eternity, if you understand."
Mentally Vingie added the last item to her list, drew a line and
added them up. The total seemed not too formidable.
"I think I do understand, though you won't believe it. I think she's
being most frightfully nice, and she loves helping you, but are you
quite sure she's as much in love with you as you are with her?" With
a magnificent effort Vingie prevented her chiseled lip from curling
and kept even the faintest trace of sarcasm out of her voice. "You
see," she went on, "in your present mood you want to scrap
everything, chuck duty to the winds, marry this girl--and then what?
What will people say about her? They mayn't be very kind. At the
best they'll say she oughtn't to have let you."
"If you were I," said the duke patiently, "and saw the gate open and
Paradise before you, would you walk in or would you turn your back
and proceed in the opposite direction?"
"Any girl," flung back Vingie, with a lash in her young voice, "can
lead you into Paradise if she wants to badly enough. We all carry
the key, but we use it when and for whom we choose. Get that fixed
in your mind, my young friend. It's a piece of truth not every girl
will tell you."
"Any girl?" he repeated vaguely. "_Any_ girl? Why--that is--you for
instance?"
She looked away. He sat up and gazed very earnestly at a young fair
girl whose perfect profile even a man said to be in love might not
despise, her delicately lovely body posed in careless grace, her
slender ankles and slim hands irresistible in their appeal. He saw,
or thought he saw, a tinge of color ebb slowly into one oval cheek.
"You mean you could--if you wanted----" he stumbled on.
She turned, smiling at him half-tenderly.
"I mean, I'd like to try, p'r'aps, before you go and get yourself
into the most awful mess. I'm not in love with you--not yet, at all
events, but I do think you're rather a dear, and you seem to know so
little about girls. You need to discover just a shade more before
you can be quite fair to the official one you don't want to marry.
But I'd have to choose my own setting, like your wonderful friend.
If you've a few days to spare, and don't mind, and won't think me
horrid, and won't tell any one, it might be a bit of a revelation to
you. Only you must realize this isn't the beginning of a flirtation.
You'll have to play straight. Is it a bargain?"
He got up and held out his hand. He was very young, rather a nice
boy, and he flushed vivid scarlet under the sun-tanned skin, but his
eyes were very steady.
"I think you're a perfect brick," he said.
The golden symbol of five thousand pounds faded utterly from Vingie's
sky. She felt suddenly a contemptible little beast and tears smarted
at the back of her eyes. She set her teeth and repeated to herself
over and over again: "I needn't take a farthing of it--I _needn't_!
And I'm only saving him from that bobbed haired cat who doesn't care
what sort of fool he makes of himself as long as she satisfies her
beastly vanity. God, how I loathe some women!"