“Yes, I do.... Do you think I could ever forget anything that happened there?... You breakfast at eight——” She laughed with sheer delight: “That is going to be wonderful, Mr. Annan—to be able to offer you breakfast in my own apartment!”
“And we lunch at the Ritz and dine at my house,” he added.
“Wonderful! Wonderful! And I can accept, because I have—proper clothes! Isn’t it perfectly enchanting—the way it all has turned out?”
That he was quite conscious of the enchantment appeared plain enough to people who chanced to enter the room where they stood together in the recess of the open window.
Several of the men so recently bereaved of Eris evinced an inclination to hover about the vicinity. Once or twice Annan was aware of black hair and ruddy features in the offing—a glimpse of Albert Smull, passing, elaborately oblivious.
“I must tell you,” said Eris, making no effort to conceal regret, “that there’s a business matter I shall have to attend to in a few minutes. Rosalind insists that the announcement be made this evening. It’s a great secret, but I’ll tell you: I’m going to have my own company!”
She gave him her hands, laughing, excited by his astonishment and the ardour of his impetuous congratulations.
“Isn’t it too splendid! I can scarcely believe it, Mr. Annan. But in our last picture it came to a point where Betsy thought we were, perhaps, interfering with each other—I mean that—that——”
“I understand.”
Eris flushed: “Betsy was so sweet and generous about it. But I, somehow, realised that I’d have to go.... It was right that I should.... And I had a talk with Frank Donnell.... I don’t know who told Mr. Smull about it, but he telegraphed that he was coming out. He came with Mr. Shill.... That was how it happened. Mr. Smull offered me my company. I was thunderstruck, Mr. Annan——”