“That wasn’t kind of me. . . no, not even sensible. . . . I’ve spoiled, everything. . . Maisie. . . . Why wasn’t I man enough to be strong?. . . Gaston entrusted her to me and I’ve failed. . . .”
As he reached the door of his room Tamea’s voice floated up the stairway. She was singing a pæan of triumph, and she sang it in her mother tongue. Ah, youth and love and golden dreams! In Tamea’s heart there was no longer room for sorrow, in her primitive but wonderfully acute intelligence there was no room for disturbing reflections touching the whys and wherefores which, in Dan Pritchard’s world, were concomitant with all decisions and made the wisdom of all issues doubtful.
“She is exotic—overpowering, like a seductive perfume. She appeals profoundly, in her solitary state, to my sympathy; her beauty, her vitality, her unspoiled and innocent outlook, the impulsiveness and naturalness of her desire, in which, from her viewpoint, there is nothing to criticize, all conspire to drive me into the very situation I would avoid because I know it to be ruinous. ‘East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet.’ Kipling knew. When they do meet it is only an illusion of meeting, and the illusion fades. And yet, from the moment that girl first gazed upon me, Maisie has been receding farther and farther from my conscious mind. An incredibly bad compliment to Maisie, and the deuce of it is I think that, subconsciously, Maisie realizes this. What a cad I have been!”
Julia knocked at his door. “Miss Morrison on the ’phone, sir.”
He went into the hall and took down the receiver. “Yes, Maisie.”
“Dan, dear,” Maisie replied, almost breathlessly, “would you think me very forward if I were to invite myself to dinner at your house tonight?”
“Indeed I would not! As a matter of fact, Maisie, I very much desire your presence at dinner tonight. I wasn’t quite aware of this desire until you spoke, but I think that in about five minutes the same bright idea would have occurred to me.”
“Uncle John came home in an ill humor. Scolded me all the way up and complained to me about you, and of course that put me in a bad temper——”
“Why have your dinner spoiled by being forced to sit and listen to your avuncular relative rave? Shall I send my car for you?”
“Do, please!” A silence. Then: “You’re quite sure you would have telephoned and invited me to dinner if I had not telephoned and invited myself?”