Jim felt himself very much indeed like those fellows in New York or Paris. She smoked gracefully; the movements displayed her hand and the long, bare, beautiful arm. The shoulder rounded as she raised the cigarette to her lips; even shoulder-straps would have marred that display. But while he admired, with a sudden movement she cast the cigarette into the fireplace: some one was at the front door.
It was Ellis. "Oh, it's only you, Stephen," she said, when his short form appeared in the doorway. "I needn't have spoiled my smoke, after all."
"You needn't have stopped anything for me," said Ellis, and added: "Just dropped in to inquire for the Judge."
Jim perceived, from Mrs. Harmon's laughter, that this was a byword with her intimates; he offered her the box of cigarettes, and when she chose one, struck a match.
"No, no!" she cried, "your cigarette."
She took it from him, her fingers brushing his; she lighted her own and then offered his again. But when he was about to take it: "No, your mouth!" she ordered, and obediently he opened his mouth to receive it. Then she began to laugh at him, richly and infectiously, so that he laughed with her, but did not miss the spectacle she presented. Standing with her back against the center table, she leaned with her hands upon it; her shoulders became more attractive than ever, and between them rose the swelling throat. He laughed with delight, and letting his eye wander over those charms, he missed the glances, amused and defiant, which passed between Mrs. Harmon and Ellis.
"So you're up to this, Lydia?" he seemed to inquire, but she to respond: "Do not you interfere, sir!"
There is no analysing those processes by which we find our affinities, no theory of chance which will satisfactorily account for the meetings of like states of mind. But here were Jim, once peevish, and Mrs. Harmon, once bored, quite satisfied at last in each other's company, and before long making this so evident that Ellis perceived that he had interrupted. They left him out; Jim spoke to him from time to time, or Mrs. Harmon turned on him that same warning glance. But if they chose to act so, Ellis did not care; in fact, an idea came to him, and he smiled as he watched Jim, like an astronomical body, moving along the line of least resistance.
For Ellis had just parted from Colonel Blanchard, who had called on him. Ellis had received the Colonel in the one room of his mansion which revealed daily occupancy, which no housekeeper might invade with duster or broom. From among many papers in many cases, Ellis drew Blanchard's promissory note, and silently laid it before him.
"You come to redeem this?" he asked. "More than prompt, Colonel Blanchard."