“I’ll give you another,” said Adèle, leaning toward him again. “If you will put through the sale of the Duane place, I will—forget that there is another man in the world but you.”
Grimshaw flushed, and the road being clear just then, he met her soft gaze.
“Is that a promise, Adèle?” he asked.
“A solemn promise,” she answered.
John Ogden returned to his hostess in time for luncheon. Leonard Grimshaw had remained for lunch at his cousin’s, for Adèle wanted him to go with her afterward to see Mr. Goldstein and talk over her contract. So it was that the three who felt very close to one another to-day sat at the table alone. Stebbins was dismissed, to his regret, for he had found breakfast very interesting and he wished to continue gathering data.
Ogden noted that the flush on Miss Frink’s cheeks, and Hugh’s subdued manner, persisted.
“I had a delightful call this morning,” he said in his usual cheerful tone. “I dropped my little bomb on the Duanes’ piazza with great effect.”
Hugh glanced up at him sharply.
“I do like those people. They have a distinctly pleasant atmosphere. Colonel Duane, always looking like somebody in particular, and so hospitable, and Miss Millicent more like a rosebud than ever this morning in a pink apron, delving in a big tin pan.”
“He went to tell them what a happy woman I am,” explained Miss Frink, looking across at Hugh. He met her eyes, and smiled acknowledgment, the more gently for the mutiny within. At last he was honest, but he was more than ever conspicuous and discussed. He hated it. His ears burned now.