“When shall I start? The sooner the better. If the post is open there is no object in wasting time.” His face lit up with sudden animation. “I say! Could we manage it in a fortnight, should you think? Miss Ward is sailing by the ‘Louisiana,’ and it would be topping if I could go by the same boat. I might wire to-day about a berth.”
“Who is Miss Ward?”
“Honor Ward—an American. Awfully jolly! No end of an heiress! I’ve met her a good deal this year, and she was staying at the Hilliards’ at the time of the accident. Awfully fond of Pixie, and a real good sort!” He laughed shortly.—“We ought to go out together, for we are mentally in the same boat. She had intended to stay over the summer, but ... her romance has gone wrong too!”
“Indeed!”
Stephen was not interested in Miss Ward’s romance, but he made no objection to the sending of a wire to the Liverpool office of the steamship company, and before evening the berth was secured and Stanor’s departure definitely dated.
“I’ll spend the rest of the time with Pixie,” was Stanor’s first determination, but each hour that passed brought with it a recollection of some new duty which must needs be performed. One cannot leave one’s native land, even for a couple of years, without a goodly amount of preparation and leave-taking, and the time allotted to Pixie dwindled down to a few hasty visits of a few hours’ duration, when the lovers sat together in the peacock walk, and talked, and built castles in the air, and laughed, and sighed, and occasionally indulged in a little, mild sparring, as very youthful lovers are apt to do.
“I must say you are uncommonly complacent about my going! A fellow hardly expects the girl he’s engaged to, to be in such uproarious spirits just on the eve of their separation,” Stanor would grumble suddenly at the end of one of his fiancée’s mirthful sallies, whereupon Pixie, her vanity hurt by his want of appreciation, would snap out a quick retort.
“If I’m sad you want me to be glad, and if I’m glad you’re annoyed that I’m not sad! There’s no pleasing you! You ought to be thankful that I’m so strong and self-controlled. ... Would it make it easier; if I were hanging round your neck in hysterics?”
“Oh, bar hysterics! But a tear or two now and then... Suppose it was Bridgie who was going instead of me?—would you be as strong and self-controlled?”
“If Bridgie were going I’d ... I’d jump—” In the midst of her passionate declaration Pixie drew herself up, shot a frightened glance, and concluded lamely, “I’d ... be very much distressed!”