Page:Her Roman Lover (Frothingham, 1911).djvu/55

 close to her, shaking hands with scarce repressed eagerness.

In these surroundings he did not look so foreign as when she had first met him, and she was again conscious of a violence of life in him which made it impossible to feel in the man and the situation that something of the unreal which the Anglo-Saxon associates with the Latin; though his carefully selected boutonnière, his slightly upturned mustache, the over-elaboration of his dress made him, as Margaret had said, a figure such as one would put upon an American stage to represent the foreign nobleman, the adventurer, or the villain.

“Is it indiscreet to ask of what you have been thinking while you walked so slowly this long time?” he asked.

“The question is not so indiscreet as an answer might be,” she answered, recalling the thoughts in question with some confusion; “but have you seen me this long time?”

“I have seen you since many minutes. Does it annoy you that I watched you?” he asked, quick to interpret her expression.

“Yes,” she answered frankly.

“I am sorry. I promise not to do so again. The next time—” He smiled, and his smile was rendered extraordinarily brilliant as much by its sud