But now Jean caught her arm.
"No, no, Marie-Louise, I did not mean that!" he cried penitently. "See, I did not mean that!"
She made no answer. Her head was averted; her eyes fixed far out over the water.
Jean bit his lips. Certainly he had had no right to give it away, but it was a small matter to make such a fuss over, and he had already promised her another. Was it possible that she had sensed anything of the wild passion that had come upon him for this beautiful American! Was she already jealous? Well, it was easily knocked out of her head, that—if one took the bull by the horns! And if he were mad it was no reason that hurt should come to Marie-Louise because of it. Some day it would be all over this madness, and was it not Marie-Louise and he who were to make their little home together? He forced a laugh again, and caught her shoulders and drew her closer.
"Confess, Marie-Louise," he said teasingly, "that it is because I gave it to another woman. Is it not so, eh? That you are—oh, là, là!—that little Marie-Louise is jealous of mademoiselle."
Her head lifted, a new light suddenly in her eyes—one of incredulous amazement.
"Jealous of mademoiselle!" she repeated wonderingly. "Of mademoiselle who is of the grand monde and so far above us and not of our world at all—and you who are a fisherman! How could I be jealous? How could such a thing be possible? Oh, Jean, don't you understand, it is not that you gave it to her—it is that you gave it at all."
"But what does it matter, then," demanded Jean, inwardly relieved, "since I will make you as many more as you please? To-morrow you shall have another much better than this one."
Footsteps sounded from the gravel walk on the cliff above; and Marie-Louise, glancing around, lifted Jean's hands from her shoulders.
"I have told you, Jean, that you can never make another," she said, with a little catch in her voice; then hurriedly: "It is mademoiselle and her father coming to see you. I must go."