On those last words of mine she gave me quite an extraordinary look, and then, as if satisfied with what she saw in my face.—
“They don’t talk to me.”
It was an assurance, it was true, it had the ring of truth, that evident genuineness which a piece of real confidence always possesses; she meant me to know that we were in the same boat of ignorance to-day. And yet, as I rose from my lunch and came forward to settle for it, I was aware of some sense of defeat, of having been held off just as the ladies on High Walk had held me off.
“Well,” I sighed, “I pin my faith to the aunt who says he’ll never marry her.”
Miss La Heu had no more to say upon the subject. “Haven’t you forgotten something?” she inquired gayly; and, as I turned to see what I had left behind—“I mean, you had no Lady Baltimore to-day.”
“I clean forgot it!”
“No loss. It is very stale; and to-morrow I shall have a fresh supply ready.”
As I departed through the door I was conscious of her eyes following me, and that she had spoken of Lady Baltimore precisely because she was thinking of something else.