“You have, I am told, Mr. Mokes, the finest yacht in this country,” said John Hoffman.
Well, it wasn’t a bad one, Mokes allowed.
“I don’t know which I would rather own,” pursued John, “your yacht or your horses. Why, Sir, your horses are the pride of New York.”
I glanced at John; he was as grave as a judge. Mokes glowed with satisfaction. Iris listened with downcast eyes, and Aunt Diana, who had at last reached the top stair, gathered her remaining strength to smile upon the scene. Mokes came out of his shell entirely, and graciously offered his arm to Aunt Diana for the long descent.
But Aunt Di could—“excuse me, Mr. Mokes”—really hold on “better by the railing;” but “perhaps Iris—”
Yes, Iris could, and did.
John looked after the three as they wound down the long spiral with a smile of quiet amusement.
“All alike,” he said to me, with the “old-comrade” freedom that had grown up between us. “La richesse est toujours des femmes le grand amour, Miss Martha.”
“Don’t quote your pagan French at me,” I answered, retreating outside, where on the little platform I had left Sara gazing out to sea. She was looking down now, leaning over the railing as if measuring the dizzy height.
“If I should throw myself over,” she said, as I came up, “my body would go down; but where would my soul go, I wonder?”