He glanced vaguely in the direction of his father’s house.
The colonel, who was standing, planted firmly with his feet well apart, and stroking his mustache, regarded him with no very friendly gaze. He saw a violent change come over the young man’s flushed face. The flush deepened and his glance toward his home became a fixed and stony stare. The colonel followed it, discovered the cause, and stopped pulling his mustache.
Fanchon, emerging from the house in a tempest of emotion, ran down the garden-path and started up the street, still smoking Daniel’s cigarette. She smoked it gracefully, but with the confidence of long habit. The small figure, too, had an assurance, a swinging grace, that seemed to differentiate it from any other figure in the world. There was a Parisian elegance, too, about her dress, and she wore a most amazing hat—a coronet of feathers, flashing red and black, a hat that no one else could have worn with such astonishing charm and style. In fact, from the tip of the highest crimson feather to the end of her tiny shoe, she was an artistic creation. Two or three passers-by walked sidewise and one little pickaninny stood transfixed, in imminent danger of swallowing a lollypop.
Colonel Denbigh coughed.
“Your wife?” he asked William politely.
William, very red, nodded.
“I want you to meet her,” he muttered hastily. “Just a moment——”
He hurried toward Fanchon. Colonel Denbigh caught Virginia’s eye and shook silently.
“Gone to capture that cigarette!” he murmured. “I think I’ll not call to-day.”
“Hush!” whispered Virginia, and blushed again, painfully this time, for her eyes were on the other two.