Then, as if with a determination of the spirit, they smiled up at him.
"Monsieur the American," said the black domino, "you have been most kind to an—an incognita—of a masque. I hope that you dig out of your sands all the secrets that you most desire."
"You sound as if you were saying good-bye," said Jack Ryder with quick denial in his blood.
The smile in her eyes flickered.
"Perhaps I have kept you too long from the other guests."
He shook his head. "They don't exist."
"Ah! I will give you the chance to say such nice things to them."
"But I never say nice things—unless I mean them!"
"Never—monsieur?"
"Never. I am very careful what I say," he assured her, even as he had assured another girl, in what different meaning, hours or centuries before. "You can believe anything that I say."