"You don't think so! But say it, Garry.... And now I think I had better retire and complete this unceremonious toilet.... And you may stroll over to pay your respects to Mrs. Cardross in the meanwhile if you choose."
He looked at her gravely. She nodded. "They all know you are due to-day."
"Shiela?"
"Yes.... Be careful, Garry; she is very young after all.... I think—if I were you—I would not even seem conscious that she had been ill—that anything had happened to interrupt your friendship. She is very sensitive, very deeply sensible of the dreadful mistake she made, and, somehow, I think she is a little afraid of you, as though you might possibly think less of her—Heaven knows what ideas the young conjure to worry themselves and those they care for!"
She laughed, kissed him and bowed him out; and he went away to bathe and change into cool clothing of white serge.
Later as he passed through the gardens, a white oleander blossom fell, and he picked it up and drew it through his coat.
Shadows of palm and palmetto stretched westward across the white shell road, striping his path; early sunlight crinkled the lagoon; the little wild ducks steered fearlessly inshore, peering up at him with bright golden-irised eyes; mullet jumped heavily, tumbling back into the water with splashes that echoed through the morning stillness.
The stained bronze cannon still poked their ancient and flaring muzzles out over the lake; farther along crimson hibiscus blossoms blazed from every hedge; and above him the stately plumes of royal palms hung motionless, tufting the trunks, which rose with the shaft-like dignity of slender Egyptian pillars into a cloudless sky.
On he went, along endless hedges of azalea and oleander, past thickets of Spanish-bayonet, under leaning cocoanut-palms; and at last the huge banyan-tree rose sprawling across the sky-line, and he saw the white facades and red-tiled roofs beyond.
All around him now, as the air grew sweet with the breath of orange blossoms, a subtler scent, delicately persistent, came to him on the sea-wind; and he remembered it!—the lilac perfume of China-berry in bloom; Calypso's own immortal fragrance. And, in the brilliant sunshine, there under green trees with the dome of blue above, unbidden, the shadows of the past rose up; and once more lantern-lit faces crowded through the aromatic dark; once more the fountains' haze drifted across dim lawns; once more he caught the faint, uncertain rustle of her gown close to him as she passed like a fresh breath through the dusk.