Stella had danced with one after another of her guests and was seated for a moment's rest on a wide turkish divan in a shaded corner of the room.
It was only a moment, but Maurice's restless glance sought her out, and smiling his excuses into the baby face of Lady Isabel Van Tyne's youngest daughter, he, much to her disappointment, strolled across the room and stood before Stella with the subdued light of a chandelier brightening his wavy hair into glittering rings about his well shaped head.
"May I call you Stella?" he whispered abruptly, as he bent slightly toward her and rested one shapely white hand on a pot of rare exotics that helped to shade the sofa on which she rested.
Mrs. Sinclair was passing at that moment and the ring on Maurice's finger caught her eye. With a tender smile she laid her hand upon his and whispered softly, "How well I remember that ring, Maurice."
It was puzzling to Stella that he should appear so confused at this simple remark of his mother and withdraw his hand so rudely from her gentle clasp, but Mrs. Sinclair had passed quietly on, and remembering that his question remained unanswered she controlled her thoughts and responded frankly, "Certainly, Maurice, I should feel awkward enough to call you Mr. Sinclair after hearing and speaking the name of Maurice so frequently for so many years. I think, really, I almost consider you my own brother," she continued shyly, although a passing blush and an almost imperceptible hesitancy in her speech gave the pretty avowal an appearance of untruthfulness.
To the many eager observers of this momentary by-play, the avowal, judged by the eye alone, seemed almost a confession of a dearer sentiment than the sisterly affection to which she had so frankly laid claim.
Notwithstanding her words of Platonic friendship Maurice smiled as if well pleased, not only with the words but their silent contradiction. He sank gracefully upon the divan by her side and in so doing his hand accidently touched hers and in an instant there came again that expression of consuming passion that had darkened his face at their first meeting. Again the mesmeric spell of his presence was upon her. A sensation, this time wholly indescribable, passed over her frame and as before she was powerless to raise her eyes until the cloud was lifted and once more the calm of a summer sky was mirrored on his exquisite face.
Just at that instant a slight crash was heard near by and both started involuntarily from their momentary forgetfulness to ascertain the cause.