I did not raise my eyes, but I have a suspicion that Eveleen looked at me a little waspishly.
“I wonder if, after all, you are cleverer than we have given you credit for. If so, you have managed to hide your light under a bushel for a good many years. You must excuse my saying so, but you seem this afternoon to have performed a sort of conjuring trick.”
“A conjuring trick? How?”
“You have captured, at a single stroke, the five hearts which, separately and individually, we have been laboriously cultivating, and all the seats which were meant for us; while we—we, alas!—have been left lamenting. Don’t you think yourself that that’s a sort of conjuring trick?”
“You know, Eveleen, men are very fickle.”
“I have had some experience of men, as you have hinted, and I am painfully aware, my dear child, of the truth of that elementary fact in natural history; but I did not know that they were fickle to quite the extent which you suggest. I personally have never before seen them perform a right-about-face quite so rapidly, or quite so impudently either.”
Audrey came and planted herself on the carpet at my feet.
“Let me look at you, Norah. Every marvel, the wise inform us, is capable of a natural explanation; so perhaps this is.” I was conscious that those lovely eyes of hers, which see everything, were subjecting me to a curious scrutiny. “Do you know that there is something different about you somehow. It’s a sort of atmosphere. I’m sensible of it as I look at you. Let me see your eyes.” I did. I saw her breathe more quickly the moment they were fastened on her face. “That’s it! Child, what hankey-pankey have you been indulging in?” She laid her hands upon my knees. “Do you know that there is magic in your eyes, and that you’re prettier than I am?”
“Audrey! Don’t talk such nonsense! As if I didn’t know!”
“I beat you in regularity of feature—in those formal charms which go to the composition of a picture; but there’s magic in your eyes. No man could look at them and remain unmoved. I can’t. They move me quite funnily. I’d like to kiss them, and I’m not a kissing person as a rule. Masculine flesh is much more susceptible than mine. Doris, come here and look at her, and tell me if you don’t see exactly what I mean.”