“Even on that it can be done. Come; where are you any worse off, even if you lose? And, at dinner, we might figure out some way for you to be better off.”
She got out a penny and looked at it a long time and then said: “Do I toss it up?” And of course the Gnome said no; because a tossed penny shows for itself. So they matched, and he looked at his coin (which showed the winning side up) and said:—
“I lose; I didn't match you.”
And then her lost misgiving surged over her and they sat and argued it. That is when I first noticed them. The Gnome won. Of course.
“So I took her to Marot's,” said the young giant, sitting up against his pillows and letting his gaze fare out into the humming heat of the day; “because I knew that, on a pinch, Mme. Marot would look after her. And I had an awful time keeping the bill of fare away from her and making her believe that she was getting only forty-three cents' worth. Courage came back to her with the food. She told me a little of her story; not much, then or afterward. I think she didn't want to claim anything of me, ever, not even sympathy. You see?”
I did see, if only vaguely. Leon the Gnome was building up a character to match the curious beauty of the face I had seen that once.
“That foreman brute wasn't her first experience. She had had to fight before; to leave good employment. To her the world was a jungle full of men who were only a horrible sort of pursuing ape. That came out later when I knew her better. My business there at that first dinner at Marot's was to get her to believe in me. Well,” he sighed, as over the memory of a formidable task accomplished, “I did it!”
He did it! Think of the gulf between those two; full, for her, of shameful memories and bristling fears; a gulf to be crossed with a shrinking heart before she could trust him; and across it he had led her by the mere power of words. Well, no; not words alone. Something shining and clear and trust-compelling back of the words; the nature of the man. Have I said that our Gnome was rather a wonderful person? He was.
“But how did you do it, miracle worker?” I demanded.
“No miracle at all. I don't understand you. I just told her about myself.”