"I love you,—strong like that," she cooed, her eyes soft with passion again. "I am not good really,—or austere,—or cold."
And I knew it was true as she paid the toll!
Presently I made her let me come and choose which frock she was to put on for dinner, and I insisted that I should stay and see her hair being brushed, and the maid, Henriette, with her French eye, beamed upon us understandingly!
While Burton almost blubbered with happiness when I told him His Ladyship and I were friends again.
"I knew it, Sir Nicholas, if you'd just made a fuss of her."
How right he was!
What a dinner we had, gay as two children, fond and foolish as sweethearts always are,—and then the afterwards!
"Let us go and see the streets," my little love implored, "I feel that we should shout our divine happiness with the crowd!"
But when we went out on the balcony to investigate, we saw that would be impossible, I am not yet steady enough on my feet to have faced that throng. So we stood there and sang and cheered with them, as they swept on towards the Arc de Triomphe, and gradually a delirious intoxication held us both, and I drew her back into the softly lighted room.
"Lover!" she whispered as she melted into my arms, and all I answered was, "Soul of Mine."