“Not glue paste,” she explained carefully; “of course, in one way, it means the same thing; but I meant that when I knew that you were going, I felt that I might just as well do as I had originally intended doing, and remain here to rest a little.”
“And you repose by coming to the Tonhalle with a gentleman?” he asked in a tone of smothered sarcasm.
“I met him this afternoon as I was walking—”
“Have you only know him first this afternoon?”
“Monsieur!” she cried in horror, “I came on the steamer with him from New York, and he went to college with my cousin!”
Von Ibn gave another shrug.
“You tell everything very cleverly,” he remarked; “but, my dear madame, we have too many difficulties,—it is always that between us, and—what is your proverb?—no smoke without over a fire?—Eh bien, I begin to grow weary.”
“Don’t you believe what I have just told you?” she demanded.
They were near the further end of the Quai where the crowd was thinnest and the play of moonbeam and shadow most alluring. He stopped and looked long upon the shining water, and then long upon her face.
“Yes,” he said at last, “I do believe.” He held out his hand, “I do believe now, but I must tell you that truly if I had been of a ‘tempérament jaloux,’ I would have been very angry this night. Yes,—of a surety.”