Billy was hardly heeding. A laugh had caught his ears, a light high laugh like the tinkle of a little silver bell through the darkness. In the shadows behind them he made out a man and a woman arm in arm.
"Just a moment," he begged of Lady Claire. "May I leave you here a moment? I must see those—I think I know——" Without listening to her automatic permission he was gone.
The next moment he had laid his hand on the arm of the man with the woman. Both spun quickly about. A babble of explanation broke out.
"Ach, mein freund, mein freund——"
"Oh, it is Billy——"
"How gut to find you here——"
"Our American Billy."
The last voice, piquantly foreign, was the voice of Fritzi Baroff. And the first voice gutterally foreign was the voice of Frederick von Deigen. Arm in arm, flushed, happy, sentimental, the two began talking in a breath, thanking Billy for the letter he had sent von Deigen which had brought them together, and apologizing for their hasty flight—"a honeymoon upon the Nile," the German joyfully explained.
Discreetly Billy forbore to make any discoveries as to the exact status of their "honeymoon." The German's face was very honestly happy, and the little dancer was brimming with restless life and vivacity.
"It was the picture in my watch—hein? The picture I carry night and day," Frederick repeated in needless explanation, and was about to draw out the picture when Billy restrained him.