'With her proper weapons.'
'You may be quite sure my husband would throw down his arms and yield at discretion.'
'I have little doubt.'
Salome closed the box on which Miss Durham had been engaged, and seated herself upon it. Then she looked up with childlike entreaty into her friend's face, and said:
'I will not allow you to go. We had schemed to have such pleasant excursions together. We have been so happy since we have known each other, and——I have not yet had the delight of showing you my baby—my best treasure.'
'You will not let me run away?'
'No, no! You will forget this little affair; it was nothing. Come and be with us again. My husband is a great reader, and knows a great deal about things of which I am ignorant, and you have travelled and seen so much that your society will interest him immensely. Oh, do stay, do not go away.'
The American girl went to the window, leaned both her arms folded on it, and looked out. She could see into the garden, and she observed Philip there, standing before the eagle's cage. He had a little twig in his hand, and he was thrusting it between the bars at the bird. She turned and said to Salome:
'No—I will go. There are several reasons which urge me to go. The insult which I received from your husband for one—and already he had allowed me to see that he disliked and despised me——'
'No, indeed,' interrupted Salome. 'I had written to him in all my letters about you, and—perhaps he was a little jealous of you.'