“What!” We started at the odd snap in Guy’s voice. “What, Iris?” And he laughed, desperately, helplessly. Guy! “Iris, that’s the first lie I’ve ever known pass your lips. Why, you’re as proud as an archangel!” We stared at him, somehow staggered by him, as he suddenly strode forward, the fair, slender giant. “Just a moment, Maurice,” said he, and bent down and kissed Iris’s cheek.
“Oh!”
This moment I can hear that despairing cry. “Oh!”
And then she tried to catch back her cry, she sobbed: “Judas!”
Guy had caught her as she started back from him like a frightened animal. “Judas nothing,” he murmured. Her face streamed with tears. Guy held her, his eyes strangely sad. “Judas nothing, my Iris,” he murmured. “You’ve won, girl. Go away and play at your lovely game of love. You’ve got me again, as you had when you were a child. I must say I like some one who really loves and really hates. I’m proud of you, Iris.”
Somehow, somehow, as Guy held her, Iris’s eyes looked through the mist towards me, and I moved my lips to make two words: Saint George. Somewhere in the mist she smiled....
She whispered: “Unfair, unfair, unfair! Guy, to kiss me like that, sweet, forgiving Guy! Oh, unfair, unfair, unfair! And I was so sure I wouldn’t cry to-night....”
Sir Maurice was fidgeting with the black ebony paper-knife. Hilary said “hm” and blew his nose. It was very funny now that it was Sir Maurice who seemed to be alone. I was glad. Iris had at last been forced to retreat from that proud battlefield on which she met men on their own ground. She had made her one gesture of womanhood; and now it was Sir Maurice who stood alone. Clever Guy. He was looking towards the General, smiling....
“Maurice,” he smiled, “the girl’s right. You were rather a sickening ass....”
“My dear Guy,” said the General with a tremendous helplessness; and he smiled. “How on earth was I to know then that a boy and gir——”