She nodded in answer and finished her ice.
"I'll have coffee on the piazza," she said, and arose.
As she did so, the ship's clock in the hallway chimed one bell.
"Half after eight!" she thought. "Fifteen minutes more until I see him. I'm as nervously anticipatory as a débutante about to receive her first proposal. What is the matter with me! I'm actually becoming afraid to meet him—to meet an old friend—the best friend a woman ever had!"
She laughed to herself, and sat down where, from the electric light at the corner, she could see his car draw up at the curb.
Tompkins brought her coffee, served it, and was dismissed. She drank two cups eagerly—to steady her nerves—then poured a third, and sipped it slowly.... Presently the butler came out to deliver a telephone message from Miss Chamberlain; when she turned again, she was just in time to catch sight of a man coming up the walk and almost at the steps.
She sprang up and glided quickly into the house. She wanted to meet Pendleton in the brightness of the living-room rather than in the subdued light of the piazza. She wanted him to have the benefit of the first impression. She was quite aware of her exquisite loveliness—more alluring to-night than ever before. And of the sapphires—his sapphires alone adorning her. She flung herself in an easy chair, crossed her silken knees with fetching abandon and caught up a magazine.
There was no ring at the bell, however—and she waited, impatiently. He should have rung—should be in the hall-way now—and yet Tompkins was not even come front! It was very strange!—Possibly he had gone around to the piazza, thinking that she might be there. She half turned—one hand on the chair arm, the other on her knee—and glanced toward the piazza door.
There came a step—and a smile of happiest greeting sprang to her face—to be chilled the next instant into frigidity.
"You!" she exclaimed indignantly.—"You!"