Gabrielle did not answer that. Her own words accused her in some way.
A great victory! A woman's victory! What would that mean in this case? For the moment she let ambition run away with her and imagination reared fine castles. They went down with a crash when she heard Harry Lassett calling her. She made some excuse and went out—just as she had gone when Harry called below her window at Hampstead.
III
A superb night with a fine round moon found them aft upon the deck, gazing over the lights of Fiume to the vine-clad hills beyond. A wonderful stillness upon land and water gave place from time to time to sounds most musical—the lingering notes of sonorous bells, the lilt of Italian song, the splash of unseen oars, and the music of ships. Lanterns shone about them, the lanterns of steamers at anchor and of the Austrian fleet. Against a glorious horizon the sails of feluccas would take fantastic shapes; the stars grouped themselves in joyous brilliancy. There were many houses upon the distant hillside and they stood there as beacons, speaking to the ships and the sea in a tongue which all understood.
Sir Jules and Silvester were in the smoking-room at this time having what Harry called "a pow-wow." Eva played sentimental themes upon the great organ in the drawing-room; the doctor and Douglas Renshaw were ashore for the good of the populace. Gabrielle, herself, set deep in a deck chair with Harry Lassett at her feet. He smoked a great pipe and talked St. Moritz. There had been trouble with his trustees, and he was not sure he could get out there this year.
"So, you see," he said, "I came along when the old chap asked me."
"A most candid way of putting it; there could have been no other reason in the world."
"Oh, I say, puss! That's nasty now."
"Not at all. To qualify candour is a crime. Well, you can't go to St. Moritz. What then?"
"I didn't say I couldn't go. I said that old Ben Stuart, my trustee, was playing the fox with me. He says I overdrew a hundred and ninety last year, and it can't go on. As if it was his own money!"