“By whom?”
And as he did not answer, she suggested with a slight smile:
“By that one of whom you spoke—that Mélodie?”
“By Melody!” he affirmed gravely.
For to-night, on the eve of his departure for America, that elusive mistress seemed especially real and compelling, no mere figment of his heated brain.
“Then, indeed,” said the Frenchwoman, with a touch of pique, “you must be in love with your Mélodie!”
The young American laughed.
“Hardly. I don’t know her!”
“I do not understand.”
“Nor I!”