"She is in love with him. What fools women are!" muttered Franks to himself. "If she married a man like that—a rich man with all that money could give—her literary career would be ended. I have had the pleasure of introducing her to the public; she is my treasure-trove, my one bright particular star. She shall not shine for anyone else. That great gift of hers shall be improved, shall be strengthened, shall be multiplied ten-thousandfold. I will not give her up. I love her just because she is clever: because she is a genius. If she had not that divine fire, she would be as nothing and worse than nothing to me. As it is, the world shall talk of her yet."
Presently Trevor and his mother arrived, and it seemed to Florence that some kind of wave of sympathy immediately caused his eyes to light upon her in her distant corner. He said a few words to his hostess, watched his mother as she greeted a chance acquaintance, and elbowed his way to her side.
"This is good luck," he said; "I did not expect to see you here to-night." He sat down by her, and Franks was forced to seek entertainment elsewhere.
Florence expected that after the way she had treated Trevor early that day he would be cold and distant; but this was not the case. He seemed to have read her agitation for what it was worth. Something in her eyes must have given him a hint of the truth. He certainly was not angry now. He was sympathetic, and the girl thought, with a great wave of comfort: "He does not like me because I am supposed to be clever. He likes me for quite another reason: just for myself. But why did not he tell me so before—before I fell a second time? It is all hopeless now, of course; and yet is it hopeless? Perhaps Maurice Trevor is the kind of man who would forgive. I wonder!"
She looked up at him as the thought came to her, and his eyes met hers.
"What are you thinking about?" he said. They had been talking a lot of commonplaces; now his voice dropped; if he could, he would have taken her hand. They were as much alone in that crowd as though they had been the only people in the room.
"What are you thinking of?" he repeated.
"Of you," said Florence.
"Perhaps you are sorry for some of the things you said this morning?"
"I am sorry," she answered gravely, "that I was obliged to say them."