"It's lovely of you!" Sherbrand said to her gratefully as they rose. She gave him her cordial smile and a soft glance from the long eyes. They took leave of their hosts and passed out together, heads slewing as the tall young figures went by.
Once in a taxi, spinning down Short Street, Sherbrand possessed himself of the hand he coveted. Its warm strong, answering clasp thrilled him to speechlessness. He looked at the long white fingers intertwined with his own, and asked himself whether he were deserving of a happiness too great to be credited. When her shoulder touched his, its warm creamy whiteness gleaming through the dead-white of her thin sleeve, his heart drummed until it seemed as though she could not but hear it. But his was not the only heart that beat....
"Thank you." It was her rich warm voice speaking close by his ear. "Thank you for being so nice to my Kittums! She is the truest little soul going. We have been chums ever since I joined the Club. Never quarrelled once—until she made up her mind to marry Franky——"
"And now you're going to marry Franky's first cousin." Sherbrand laughed rather breathlessly. "'Marry' ... 'Marriage.' Two splendid words with meanings and meanings beyond meanings packed into them. Isn't it wonderful? ..." He gripped the warm white hand in his strong brown one. "Pat, your pulses are playing a tune!"
"So are yours," she answered in a low tone.
"What is it?" He bent his head and set his lips in a swift caress to the back of the white hand. Then he turned it gently over and looked earnestly at the blue wrist-veins. They were full and throbbing tumultuously. Her blood was answering to the call of his. He set a second swift kiss upon them and his voice was unsteady as he said:
"I know the name of the tune, my wonder. Patrine! Love!—it's the Wedding March!"
"Whose? Grieg's, or Wagner's in Lohengrin, or Haydn's?"
"Neither Wagner's nor Haydn's nor Grieg's. Yours and mine! I told Lord Norwater to-day that I meant to make sure of you before I fly for the Front."
"You're going to the Front? Oh!—why?" Her long eyes looked at him with sharp terror in them. He answered: