Jimmy had no forebodings, but rioted gorgeously in returning health, in a whole pack of new emotions, and in what he supposed to be his lady's favor. Aleck, more philosophical, took his happiness with a more quiet gusto, not provoking the frown of the gods. But for Jim the day of reckoning was coming.
One day Aleck joined him, walking up and down the porch. Jim was in one of his boyish, cocksure moods.
"I know what you're going to say," he began, before Aleck could spring his news. "You're going to marry the princess."
"Just so," said Aleck. "How'd you know? Clairvoyance?"
"Nope."
"Well, you needn't look so high and mighty about it, old man. Why don't you do the same thing yourself? Then we'll have a double wedding."
"I've thought of that," said Jim.
As the two men talked, Agatha and Mélanie, both dressed in white, strolled side by side down the garden path toward the wall. They were deep in conversation, their backs turned toward the veranda.
"I don't see that they look so much alike," announced Jim, who had but recently learned all the causes and effects of the Chatelard business. Aleck's eyes gleamed.
"Which one, as they stand there now, do you take to be Miss Redmond?" he asked.