The hostility Forbes read in Nichette's look was merely her impatience at being kept a few moments longer from her sergeant after having been detained an hour by a quarrel of the Enslees—a quarrel ending in a defiant announcement from Willie that he was going to see the wickedest show he could find in Paris, and from Persis an hilarious "Bonne chance! I hope you find somebody to take you off my hands for a while!"
This had horrified Willie as a sacrilege, and he had regretted his vow. But in the court of the hotel he found two Americans who had typically arrived in Paris, and bibulously prepared for a night of social investigation without having taken the trouble to learn a word of French, the distinction of coins, or the system of cab fares and tips. They welcomed Enslee as a life-saver, embraced him, and bade him confirm their worst suspicions of Paris.
This Forbes did not know, and he misinterpreted Nichette's brusquerie. His own thoughts were brusque. He loathed himself, and hated Persis and blamed her as if she had cast down a net from her window and dragged him to her feet.
He paced the lavishly furnished reception-room of the suite and resolved to escape before it was too late. The thought of the cold loneliness of the streets, of the town, of the world, held him back. He was unutterably forlorn. He sank into a chair and clenched his hands together.
Then he heard Persis' voice. It came through the glistening portières masking the doors to the room adjoining, a kind of living-room. Music and welcome and all of Persis' beauty were in the little hospitable words:
"Come in here, Harvey, won't you? I can't budge, and I'm all by myself."
Wondering where she was and how he should find her, he pushed through the curtains timidly, as timidly as Joseph entering Potiphar's wife's boudoir.
He found Persis cuddled up on a chaise longue of gold and satin. She was almost lost in a jumble of parcels and toys and knickknacks. She had been writing addresses, and the fingers she gave into his were smudged with ink.
She sat like a sultana, with her feet curled under her. She wore a light confection of a house-gown of some astonishingly attractive hue, with plentiful display of white lace and arms and bosom and a good deal of stocking. She wore a boudoir-cap fetchingly awry.
Forbes put her hand up to his lips and laughed as he kissed the smudge of ink. It was the first laugh he had known for days. It was like the first chuckle of rain after a drought. It brought moisture to his eyes.