But his Cora kissed Harry instead. And as she did so, the unfailing instinct given to woman told her that that kiss was a mistake.
In the next instant, the fat arms had disengaged themselves from the young man's neck, and Miss Dobbs had slipped from his knee and was standing looking at him.
Her gesture was striking and picturesque; also she had the air of a tragedy queen.
"Harry," she said, with a catch in her voice, "you are breaking my heart."
The Sailor had already been informed of that. He had tried not to believe it, but facts were growing too strong for him. A superb tear was in the eyes of Miss Dobbs. The sight of it thrilled and startled him.
Twice before in his life had he seen tears in the eyes of a woman, and with his abnormal power of memory he vividly recalled each occasion now. The first time was in the eyes of Mother, the true woman he would always reverence, when she took off his clothes after his first flight from Blackhampton, and put him into a bath; the second time was in the eyes of Miss Foldal, and she also was a true woman whose memory he would always honor, when she said good-bye on the night of the second departure from the city of his birth. But the tears in the eyes of Mother and Miss Foldal were not as the superb and terrible tear in the eye of Miss Cora Dobbs.
"Don't think I blame you, Harry," said that lady with a Jocasta-like note, trying to keep the bitterness out of her tone. "I'm only a lonely and unprotected girl who will soon be on the shelf, but that's no fault of yours. Yet, somehow, I thought you were different. Somehow, I thought you was a gentleman."
Miss Dobbs had no illusions on that point, but she well knew where the shoe was going to pinch.
"I'll be a mark and a laughing stock," said the tragic Cora, "as poor Pussy was before Caradoc made up his mind to marry her. While he was plain Bill Jackson nothing was good enough for Pussy. Used to take her to the Coliseum and on the river in the summer, and used to come to her flat a bit lower down the Avenue to take tea with her and her friends every Sunday of his life. And then suddenly Bill came into the title, and poor Pussy got a miss from my lord. We all thought at first she would go out of her mind. She worshiped the ground that Bill walked upon. Besides, she couldn't bear to be made a mark of by her friends; and being nothing but a straight girl there was always her reputation to consider. Poor Pussy had to take a sleeping draught every night for months. But Caradoc played cricket in the end as he was bound to do, being a gentleman by birth, and Pussy is now a countess with two children, a boy and a girl, and only last summer she invited me to go and spend a fortnight with her at her place in Ireland, but, of course, I couldn't, because I hadn't the clothes. Still, I'm glad for Pussy's sake. She was always one of the best, was Pussy. All's well that ends well, isn't it?" And Miss Jocasta Dobbs very abruptly broke down.
It was a breakdown of the most nerve-shattering kind. The tears streamed down her face. She struggled almost hysterically not to give way, yet the more she struggled, the more she did give way.