As Rouletta moved toward the door Pierce stopped her. There was a ring in his voice as he said:
"Rouletta, I want you to meet Miss Cavendish. I want the two nicest girls in the world to know each other. Josephine, this is Miss Kirby, of whom I've said so much." Then without reason he laughed joyously, and so did the colonel's daughter.
The latter took Rouletta's hand in a warm and friendly clasp. Her smiling lips were tremulous. Engagingly, shyly, she said:
"Pierce has told me how splendid you've been to him, and I'm sure you're as happy as we are, but—things always come out right if we wish for them hard enough. Don't you think so?"
The Countess Courteau was walking slowly when Rouletta overtook her a block or so down the street. She looked up as the younger woman joined her.
"Well," she said, "I presume you saw. Not a look, not a thought for any one but her—that other girl."
"Yes, I saw." There was a pause, then: "She's wonderful. I think I'm very glad."
"Glad?" Hilda raised her brows; she glanced curiously at the speaker.
"If I had a brother I'd want him to love a girl like that."
"But—you have no brother, outside of 'Poleon Doret." Hilda was more than ever amazed when her companion laughed softly, contentedly.