"I know. You mean it's dreadful to have other people know the truth?"
"No; but I can't help my character, can I? It's not my fault if I have faults. It's all written in my palm and I can't alter it. Only, I mean it's awful to know exactly what's going to happen and not be able to prevent it."
"It's worse not to want to." Fancy waved her hand to some one in the street.
Mrs. Page withdrew from the conversation, routed, and devoted herself to a study of the Chinese masks, casting an occasional impatient glance into the anteroom. Fancy polished her rings with her handkerchief.
Granthope's voice was now heard, talking pleasantly with Fleurette, who was smiling, as he had promised. As she left, flushed and happy, Granthope greeted Mrs. Page, and escorted her, bubbling with talk, into the studio. The door closed upon a pervading odor of sandalwood, Mrs. Page's legacy to Fancy, who sniffed at it scornfully.
Many cable-cars had passed without Fancy's having recognized any one worth bowing to, before the next client appeared; but, at that visitor's entry, she became a different creature. Her eyes never really left him, although she seemed, as he waited, to be busy about many things.
He was a smart young man, a sort of a bank-clerk person, dressed neatly, with evidence of considerable premeditation. His hair was parted in the middle, his face was cleanly shaven. His sparkling, laughing eyes, devilishly audacious, his pink cheeks and his cool self-assured manner gave him an appearance of juvenile, immaculate freshness, which rendered an acquaintance with such a San Francisco girl as Fancy Gray, easy and agreeable. He laid his hat and stick against his hip jauntily, and asked:
"Could I get a reading from Mr. Granthope without waiting all day for it?" As he spoke he loosed a frivolous, engaging glance at her.
"He'll be out in just a moment," Fancy replied with more interest than she had heretofore shown. "Won't you sit down and wait, please?"
He withdrew his eyes long enough to gallop round the room with them, but they returned to her like horses making for a stable. He took a seat, pulled up his trousers over his knees, drew down his cuffs, felt the knot in his tie and smoothed his hair, all with the quick, accurate motion due to long habit. "Horrible weather," he volunteered debonairly.