“I saw you one night about three weeks ago at the Opera, in Brussels, M’sieur Falconer,” the girl exclaimed, laughing. “You were in a box with two ladies, one was elderly, and the other was probably her daughter—eh? You seemed very attentive to them—especially to the younger one.”
Geoffrey smiled mysteriously.
“Well—I did not know that you were watching, mademoiselle,” he said laughing. “They were friends of mine.”
“Your fiancée—eh?”
“How absurd!” he exclaimed. “Whatever makes you think that?”
“Oh!—well—from your careful attention to her,” said mademoiselle, raising her wine-glass. “When a man is engaged he always has it written across his back. Women can conceal their love, but a man seldom.”
“Just as, I suppose, women delight in tears—eh?”
“Ah! don’t let us be too philosophical. The weather is too good. Let’s keep that for a dark and rainy day,” she laughed, leaving her companion surprised and puzzled that she should have been watching him on that night when he took Mrs. Beverley and her daughter to the Théâtre de la Monnaie.
From the first this very smart girl had puzzled him. In the midst of his work over at the aerodrome on the opposite side of the river she had come to him once or twice with messages of unimportance.
Suddenly, as they sat together over their dessert and liqueurs, Geoffrey recollected Amelot’s words, and asked: