“You did,” she said, faintly; “yesterday on the bridge you said if I would come you would be careful. Nobody would suspect our relation to each other.”
“Nobody will know from me. I am propriety, reticence itself, when there is any one about. Only when we are alone will I give you a chance to snub me.”
“But you promised for all the time.”
“Pardon me, darling, I did not. In all the long list of things you made me swear not to do in the presence of strangers, there was not a word said about my behaviour when we were alone.”
Nina was staggered. “Didn’t I?” she gasped. “That is why you are so bad. What a simpleton I am! Let me go to bed.”
“All right, you dear, little, bad-tempered thing. My only wish is to please you,” and he released her arm and drew his cigar-case from his pocket.
A near lamp threw a lurid glare over his swarthy features, but her figure was completely in the shadow. To his surprise, she did not disappear with an abusive sentence. She still lingered, and, drawing nearer him, she stood for a minute in deepest thought. Then she took him gingerly by the coat sleeve, and whispered, in faintly audible tones, “’Steban!”
“Yes, darling,” he muttered, holding his breath as he bent down to the animated face now glowing with some sudden and exquisite emotion.
“I want to tell you what is in my mind.”
“Just what I would like to hear,” he uttered, in the same cautious way.