As he brooded on the note, trying to grasp the almost incredible truth, the cruel look about his mouth deepened.
Putting the note into his pocket, he poured himself another cup of coffee. Then he sat on, staring at the purple pansies, no longer lost in dreams of love and delight, where his one aim was to be all the girl imagined him to be; but in a savage reverie that had love in it, perhaps, but of quite another quality than that which he had already offered.
Full of anger and injured pride as Le Breton was, it did not prevent him going over to the hotel and inquiring for Miss Langham.
He learnt that she was out, on board her yacht. And it seemed to him that she had fled from his wrath.
But he was wrong.
Pansy had gone there knowing he would be sure to come and inquire into the meaning of her note. On board her yacht there was more privacy; a privacy she wanted for Le Breton's sake, not her own. Considering his fiery Latin temperament, he might not take his congé in the manner of her more stolid nation. There might be a scene.
She never imagined he would take her decree calmly. There was an air about him as if he had never been thwarted in any way. She was prepared for some unpleasant minutes—minutes, nevertheless, that she had no intention of shirking, which she knew she had brought upon herself by her impetuous promises.
She was sitting alone in her own special sanctum on the yacht.
It was a large saloon—boudoir, music-room, and study combined; white and gold and purple, like herself, with a grand piano in one corner, deep chairs upholstered in yellow with purple cushions, a yellow carpet and white walls and ceiling.
In the midst of it she sat cool and collected, in a simple white yachting suit.