"I'm so glad! And I know what's in your heart, Reese, what your eyes are shining about! The sixteen thousand—"
"Oh, plague take the sixteen thousand!" His laugh rang out clear and vibrant. "It's you, my dear, you! Just ourselves, set right again."
A tremulous smile broke on her lips. "Yes—and I've been so jealous of those sixteen thousand! Now kiss me—and forget everything—"
Their lips met.
CHAPTER IX
Wednesday night in New York—a warm, sweet night of April. The windows of Mrs. Fowler's apartment were open to the touch of melting spring that drifted in from Central Park, just across the street.
Lawrence Macgowan glanced across the room, caught the eye of Mrs. Fowler, and a slight smile touched his lips. Undoubtedly his hostess quite comprehended the subtle depths of that smile, for her answering glance was whimsical and flitted lightly to Mrs. Findlater. For Henry C. Findlater was here, pursily important, and his wife—a meek, colorless woman who was distinctly not at her ease.
Here, too, was Milligan, of the law firm in which Macgowan was silently interested; and Harry Lorenz, a cynically genial bachelor who cherished a fancied resemblance to John Drew; and finally Mrs. Fowler's accompanist, one Percival Hemingway. This last was a smoothly sweet person who spoke in lisping accents mild and was a delicately cultured soul. His affiliations with a musical journal made him quite useful at times.
Over this gathering Macgowan reigned supreme, for various and sundry reasons. He was deferred to and lionized, and enjoyed himself mightily—enjoyed the half-frightened toadying of Findlater, enjoyed above all the art of his hostess. For Mrs. Fowler could sing, and Macgowan, possessing a real discrimination, laid at her feet a tribute of appreciation which was sincere.