"Be tranquil. I have other cats to whip."
Mme. Machin was hatted and gloved. Loftus stuck his hand in his pocket. Mme. Machin was too genteel to notice. From the pocket he drew a roll of yellow bills. Mme. Machin affected entire unconcern. The bills he put in her paw. Mme. Machin was so entirely unconscious of the liberty that she turned to the mantel, picked up a bag of bead, opened it, took from it a little puff with which she dusted her nose. Then the puff went back into the bag. With it went the bills.
"I run," she announced. She moved to the door. There, looking at Loftus over her shoulder, she stopped. "You come again?"
For reply Loftus made a gesture.
"Yes," said the woman. "Naturally. It depends. But let me know. It is more commodious. Pas de scandale, eh?"
To this Loftus made no reply whatever. But his expression was translatable into "what do you take me for?"
"Allez!" the ex-first lady resumed. "I have confidence."
She opened the door and through it vanished. Loftus removed his gloves, seated himself at the piano, ran his fingers over the keys, struck a note which suggested another and attacked the waltz from "Faust." The appropriateness of it appealed to him. As he played he hummed. Then, passing upward with the score, he reached the "Salve Dimora," Faust's salute to Marguerite's home. But in the den where he sat the aria did not fit. He went back again to the waltz. Then, precisely as on the stage Marguerite appears, Marie entered.
Loftus jumped up, went to her, took her hand. It was trembling. He led her to a sofa, seating himself at her side, her hand still in his.
He looked at her. She had the prettiness and timidity of a kitten, a kitten's grace as well. Like a kitten, she could not have been vulgar or awkward had she tried. But association and environment had wrapped about her one of the invisible yet obvious mantles that differentiate class from class. Loftus was quite aware of that. He was, though, equally aware that love is a famous costumer. There are few mantles that it cannot remove and remake. That the girl loved him he knew. The tremor of her hand assured him more surely than words.