"I'm going to bring them together, you know," he assured her in confusion.
"I do hope so," she demurely replied.
"We're wasting an awful lot of time!" called Winnie. "The Canals of Venice! We haven't been in this." And she promptly bought six tickets.
In the bustle of taking boats an officious guard succeeded, for the thousandth time that day, in the joyful duty of separating a party; and Constance and Johnny were left behind to enjoy the next boat all to themselves.
It was dim and cool in there—all narrow gravity canals, and quaint canvas buildings, and queer arches, and mellow lights, with little dark curves and long winding reaches, and a restfulness almost like solemnity.
It was the first time Johnny had been in such close companionship with Constance as this strange isolation gave them, and he did not know what to say. After all, what was the use of saying? They were there, side by side, upon the gently flowing water, far, far away from all the world; and it would seem almost rude to break that bliss with language, which so often fails to interpret thought.
Constance's hand was drooping idly across her knee and, by an uncontrollable impulse, Johnny's hand, all by itself, slid over and gently clasped the whiter and slenderer one. It did not draw away; and, huddled up on their low narrow seat, bumping against the wooden banks and floating on and on, they cared not whither, they stared into oblivion in that semi-trancelike condition that sometimes accompanies the peculiar state in which they found themselves.
"Oh-ho-o-o-o!" rang the clear voice of Winnie from a parallel canal just behind them.
Constance, flushing violently, attempted to jerk her hand away; but Johnny, animated by a sudden aggressiveness, clasped it tightly and held it—captive—up to view.
At that interesting moment another sharp turn in the canal brought them face to face with an approaching boat in which were Paul Gresham and Jim Collaton!