“Oh, is it so long as that? I should have imagined it was something like a fortnight. Time passes quickly.”
“That is a question of psychology. But now at last I find you when I least expect you.”
“I have slipped out for a moment,” she explained, “to enjoy this beautiful prospect. One has no such view from the Queen’s end of the terrace. One cannot see the moon.”
“I cannot see the moon from where I am standing,” said he.
“No, because you have turned your back upon it,” said she.
“I have chosen between two visions. If you were to authorise me to join you, aloft there, I could see both.”
“I have no power to authorise you,” she laughed, “the terrace is not my property. But if you choose to take the risks——”
“Oh,” he cried, “you are good, you are kind.” And in an instant he had joined her on the terrace, and his heart was fluttering wildly with its sense of her nearness to him. He could not speak.
“Well, now you can see the moon. Is it all your fancy painted?” she asked, with her whimsical smile. Her face was exquisitely pale in the moonlight, her eyes glowed. Her voice was very soft.
His heart was fluttering wildly, poignantly. “Oh,” he began, but broke off. His breath trembled. “I cannot speak,” he said.