“I thank monsieur––” He steadied his voice, bowed in the faultless garments which were his badge of service, and went his way through the silence in the house.
Neeland had walked to the long windows giving on the pretty balcony with its delicate, wrought-iron rails and its brilliant masses of geraniums.
Outside, along the Avenue, in absolute silence, a regiment of cuirassiers was passing, the level sun blazing like sheets of crimson fire across their helmets and breastplates. And now, listening, the far clatter of their horses came to his ears in an immense, unbroken, rattling resonance.
Their gold-fringed standard passed, and the sunlight on the naked sabres ran from point to hilt like liquid blood. Sons of the Cuirassiers of Morsbronn, grandsons of the Cuirassiers of Waterloo—what was their magnificent fate to be?—For splendid it could not fail to be, whether tragic or fortunate.
The American’s heart began to hammer in his breast and throb in his throat, closing it with a sudden spasm that seemed to confuse his vision for a moment and turn the distant passing regiment to a glittering stream of steel and flame. 415
Then it had passed; the darkly speeding torrent of motor cars alone possessed the Avenue; and Neeland turned away into the room again.
And there, before him, stood Rue Carew.
A confused sense of unreasoning, immeasurable happiness rushed over him, and, in that sudden, astounding instant of self-revelation, self-amazement left him dumb.
She had given him both her slim white hands, and he held to them as though to find his bearings. Both were a trifle irrelevant and fragmentary.
“Do you c-care for tea, Jim?... What a night! What a fright you gave us.... There are croissants, too, and caviar.... I would not permit anybody to awaken you; and I was dying to see you––”