"Do you think this is a suitable business for you?" she asked, her manner stately and almost reproachful, her voice low but icy, her beautiful head turning slowly toward him, and the light of those magnetic eyes seeming to shine through his very soul.
Lloyd had not been silent from any realisation of the difference in their station, any humble acknowledgment of the superiority of her world. He could not speak, his heart beat so fast; his proximity to the goddess that she seemed abashed his every thought. Her beautiful dress, her dainty hands, the exquisite pose of her head, the soft flutter of her lovely hair in the wind, each made its own bewildering demand for homage. He was in the thrall of an appreciated bliss, so perfect, so unexpected that it almost overwhelmed him. He had never dreamed that he might be so near heaven as thus alone with her. And yet until to-day he had not known that she existed. He could scarcely realise that she could turn her head and look into his eyes and speak directly to him—it scarcely mattered what were the words. The day had been hard; the dangers that menaced him were great; the difficulties that pressed him down were heavy; and suddenly, in a moment, he was translated into elysium. Swinging so elastically in the wind—the medium of the air a purple dusk, the river molten silver in the moon where the reflection of the splendid cresset glanced upon it and the rest mystery, the mountains vast imposing barriers against all the sordid world beyond, the town but a bevy of flickering lights below, and above the pure white fires of the constant stars—they two were side by side, while she, the ideal loveliness, she spoke to him!
"Beg pardon," Lloyd said, catching at the necessity of reply.
"Do you think this is a suitable business for you?" she repeated.
He stared at her for a moment amazed, hardly comprehending. Then recovering himself he made an effort at appropriate rejoinder. "The business ought to be better of course," he said. Then he hesitated doubtfully. His heart could but expand toward her, though his sensitive nature must needs feel the topic intrusive. "You see—we were misinformed. A town of this size generally has an outlying population that makes up a toler'ble payin' crowd. We are playin' to very little money. Business is poor—and that's the truth——" he paused abruptly, for she had blushed so deeply in embarrassment that he felt that he was altogether beyond his depth.
"Oh, I don't mean the financial returns," she said, beginning to falter. She hardly knew, she said to herself, what she would be at. Why should she have fancied that this man would understand her—why should she upbraid him with a calling below his merits? Certainly she did not understand herself.
"Oh—beg pardon," he said, obviously confused, gazing searchingly at her in the electric light. Her face was pale, a trifle agitated, grave; her eyes—they looked immortal, they were from the beginning of the world, for all time to come—the beautiful eyes, with a thought—was it pity, was it sorrow, was it faith—what was it in their depths?
"I meant—I meant," she hesitated, realising that she must follow her suggestion through—that there was no opportunity for withdrawal, for recantation, "I meant that it seems that you ought to have a better kind of business."
"It is a mighty good business for the money that is in it—it is the best show for the investment that ever was under canvas," he protested with sudden fervour—he was loyal to the merits of his funny little show.
It was all out of the question, she felt now—one of her sudden mad impulses—but an explanation must needs come. She would not for the world decry the little exhibition, on which he had lavished such whole-souled labour and thought and eager solicitude. Besides she had her object which she could hardly interpret even to herself. Her lips curved suddenly in the sweet smile that was wont to embellish them; her eyes flashed with her ready laughter. He was looking eagerly, intently at her. But her ridicule was genial—she was laughing with him rather than at him. "I'm not saying a word against the greatest show on earth nor the high-dive artist, nor the snake-eater, nor the beautiful dancing oread; but I shall never see you again, and I thought I would tell you something that occurred to me to-day."