Queen Aphrodite,
Born of the sea,
Beautiful dutiful daughters
Are we!
When I alighted once more upon the earth from the heaven of this song, who should I find seated within a table of me but the very couple I was at the moment so unexpectedly interested in? But they were far too absorbed in each other to notice me, and consequently I was able to hear all of importance that was said. I regret that I cannot gratify the reader with a report of their conversation, for the excuse I had for listening was one that is not transferable. A woman's happiness was at stake. No other consideration could have persuaded me to means so mean save an end so noble. I didn't even tell Rosalind all I heard. Mercifully for her, the candour of fools is not among my superstitions. Suffice it for all third persons to know—what Rosalind indeed has never known, and what I hope no reader will be fool enough to tell her—that Orlando was for the moment hopelessly and besottedly faithless to his wife, and that my services had been bespoken in the very narrowest nick of time.
Having, as the reader has long known, a warm personal interest in his attractive companion, and desiring, therefore, to think as well of her as possible, I was pleased to deduce, negatively, from their conversation, that Sylvia Joy knew nothing of Rosalind, and believed Orlando to be a free, that is, an unmarried man. From the point of view, therefore, of her code, there was no earthly reason why she should not fall in with Orlando's proposal that they should leave for Paris by the "Mayflower" on the following morning. Orlando, I could hear, wished to make more extended arrangements, and references to that well-known rendezvous, "Eternity," fell on my ears from time to time. Evidently Sylvia had no very saving belief in Eternity, for I heard her say that they might see how they got on in Paris for a start. Then it would be time enough to talk of Eternity. This and other remarks of Sylvia's considerably predisposed me towards her. Having concluded their arrangements for the heaven of the morrow, they rose to take a stroll along the boulevards. As they did so, I touched Orlando's shoulder and begged his attention for a moment. Though an entire stranger to him, I had, I said, a matter of extreme importance to communicate to him, and I hoped, therefore, that it would suit his convenience to meet me at the same place in an hour and a half. As I said this, I flashed his wife's ring in the light so obviously that he was compelled to notice it.
"Wherever did you get that?" he gasped, no little surprised and agitated.
"From your wife," I answered, rapidly moving away. "Be sure to be here at eleven."
I slipped away into the crowd, and spent my hour and a half in persuading Rosalind that her husband was no doubt a little infatuated, but nevertheless the most faithful husband in the world. If she would only leave all to me, by this time to-morrow night, if not a good many hours before, he should be in her arms as safe as in the Bank. It did my heart good to see how happy this artistic adaptation of the truth made her; and I must say that she never had a wiser friend.
When eleven came, I was back in my seat at the Cafe du Ciel. Orlando too was excitedly punctual.
"Well, what is it?" he hurried out, almost before he had sat down.
"What will you do me the honour of drinking?" I asked calmly.
"Oh, drink be d——d!" he said; "what have you to tell me?"