"Well, don't you think the scar adds to my list of attractions?" he asked banteringly, as he turned to Mrs. Chalmers, who beamed approval upon him. "The girls all think I acquired it in some brave, though mysterious, manner—those who don't know that I got my sky-piece cracked in a wreck in Texas last year."
From that hour he began a course of small attentions, minor courtesies, but none the less meaning, all of which have been calculated to make Sophie regard him with quite a degree of favorable interest, and if I am not mistaken none of these calculations has failed to hit the mark. But since their first meeting I have only once heard him refer to that unusual resemblance she bears to some one whom he has known; and I am sure he found the impulse then to speak so strong and sudden that the words were out before he had time to think, for Sophie so clearly disliked a mention of the subject. This proves to me that they have known each other in some mysterious manner, but as she has never told me the secret, of course I have never questioned her.
Last night at the dinner table was when it came about, and, when I think it over, it was a ludicrous happening rather than a sentimental or even mysterious one. Mrs. Chalmers had been holding forth upon some Scriptural interpretations which her beloved pastor has recently made use of in his sermons, and, among others, the casting of pearls before swine was brought forward for discussion.
From the moment the word "swine" was mentioned Mr. Maxwell's face took on its bewildered look and he fixed his eyes on Sophie with that same intensity of expression which they have worn so often this last week. Suddenly he seemed to remember what his mind was so evidently searching for.
"Swine! Pigs!" he blurted out, in such a startled way that we all instinctively stopped eating to await developments. "That's what I heard you—or the girl with your voice—saying that night. I remember it distinctly now! It was hot—heavens, how hot it was!—and there was a fierce pain in my head for some reason; but I heard your voice, just a short distance away from me, saying: 'This little pig went to market, this little pig stayed at home; this little pig had—' and there you broke off, because you couldn't remember what it was the third little pig had. There was a peevish child's voice crying: 'Tell little pigs! Tell little pigs,' and then a man's voice, trying to help you out. You asked the man, 'Do you know what the third little pig had—or did?' But he couldn't remember either. He began saying the doggerel over again, 'This little pig went to market; this little pig stayed at home; this little pig had—'
"'Roast beef, damn you,' I hollered, for somehow I wasn't as near being dead as you thought. 'Roast beef, but you needn't stand outside my door rehashing it all night. Then you and the man laughed in a surprised, though subdued way, and walked away from me, although I didn't hear the sound of footsteps."
His scar showed very white as he finished this queer little story; and he looked at Sophie almost beseechingly. He had the appearance of a man groping about in the dark.
Sophie, too, was clearly embarrassed, but said nothing by way of explanation; and, ridiculous as the incident was, not one of us even smiled.
There was a heavy, tense silence about the board for a moment, then Richard spoke.
"Upon my word, but this is interesting," he said, in a slow, sarcastic drawl. "Sophie, have you been traveling in vaudeville?"