“But I have messages for you from the Lady Zoe. Are you happy here?”
The glance she turned on him thrilled him with the remembrance of that other glance of yesterday. But she recollected herself quickly. “At least I am happier than yesterday morning I expected to be,” she said. “Yes, lord, tell the Lady Zoe that all is well. I am here in my own place, in the life to which I belong. It must be the best for me. Why should I not be happy?”
“Look me in the face and tell me that you are, Danaë.”
He spoke very gently, but Danaë could not meet his kind eyes. “No, that is unfair. You have no right to ask me that!” she said incoherently, with both hands pressed to her breast. “Go, lord, go, and tell my Princess that I tried to remember what I had learnt from her, but it would be happier for me if I could forget it. Ah, lord, if you have any kindness for the poor girl whom you once called beautiful, go, and let me forget!”
She avoided his attempt to detain her, and fled. Armitage would have followed her, but started to find himself suddenly confronted by Petros, who might have sprung from the earth, but more probably from the recess formed by the side of the gateway and the wall.
“My lord the Despot awaits Milordo,” he said with a bow.
Had he heard all that had passed? It was impossible to say; his face told nothing, and after one quick glance at him, Armitage turned again towards the great gate, very much perturbed in his mind. Should he ask Danaë to marry him? Pity, admiration, romance, urged him to do so; reason, prudence, a kind of shame that the man who had loved Zoe Theophanis should think of linking himself with a mere beautiful savage, held him back. In his mental struggle the warning Danaë had given him was slighted. These were not the days when British peers could be held to ransom in the islands of the Egean, nor would Prince Christodoridi be foolish enough to dream of such a thing.
“You have something to say to me, friend Milordo?” The words, uttered with extreme coldness, roused him from his reverie. Prince Christodoridi stood before him, but did not hold out his hand or offer any other sign of welcome. “I understand that such is the custom of your country,” he added impatiently, as Armitage stared at him.
“You must pardon me, lord, but I have not the slightest idea——”
The truth never occurred to Armitage, for Petros was still behind him, and it was impossible he should have told his master yet of the meeting under the wall. The Despot waved his hand magnificently.