Von Ibn shrugged his shoulders.
“Rien du tout,” he said easily; “he has think most probably that you have lost something from you—a pin or a button, you know. When a woman runs so, that is what every one knows.”
“Do they?”
“Oh!”
He finished his dinner in short order and then looked a smiling inquiry into her eyes.
“We shall go now on to the terrace for the coffee; yes?” he asked as he rose, and she rose too and went with him to where their little table was spread among the dusk and the roses. The band in the Stadtgarten was playing delightfully, and its sweetness came across water and park to search out their very souls. The Bodensee spread all beyond in a gray peace that seemed to bid the very leaves upon the trees to slumber. The steamers were coming to their harbor rest in answer to the flaming summons flung them by the searchlight at the head of the pier. They glided in in slow procession, shivered at anchor, and submitted to the lulling of the lake’s night breath.
Von Ibn rested his elbow on the table and his chin upon his hand. He looked dreamily out across the water for a long time before saying:
“You pardon my impoliteness then of last night? I am not come to trouble you here, only to ask that, and something else, and then I go again at once.”
“Yes, I will pardon you,” said Rosina gently. She too was looking thoughtfully out into the twilight on the water. “Only don’t do so again.”