Page:Mr. Wu (IA mrwumilnlouisejo00milniala).pdf/76

 too close, and repeated her grave question, "Is thy honorable sister like Nang Ping, or even more beautiful?"

Basil laughed with kindly patronage. "Hilda?" Strolling to the wide stone bench he threw his hat on to it and sat down. "All nice girls are like each other, Nang Ping. Hilda's so-so. But Tom Carruthers thinks she's 'top-side' nice. Carruthers' the governor's secretary, and I rather think he's going to be my honorable brother-in-law. The governor won't object. Tom's right enough, and old Carruthers got any amount of tin. The Right Reverend John B. thinks Sis nice too, or I'm greatly mistaken. It's a queer freak for a parson, for Hilda isn't exactly churchified, but Bradley finds her nice all right."

"And my lord finds me nice?"

The gray eyes narrowed. "Very nice," the man answered, and held out his arms.

She went at once and sat down on the other end of the bench. Gregory bent and kissed her, and presently she kissed him in return. And the sudden darkness thickened, creeping closer, for there is no true gloaming, no lingering dusk, in the Orient. It is day there, or else it is night.

The glow-worms came out then and speckled the garden with tiny points of fire. Nang Ping called them by a prettier name: kwang yin têng, lamps of mercy, as her father had called them when, as a boy of ten, he crossed Sze-chuan to wed her baby mother in Pekin.

They kissed again, the man and the girl. Kissing is not a Chinese art. Basil Gregory had taught Wu Nang Ping to kiss.

"Oh! if only I could!" the girl said impulsively, and then broke off as suddenly as she had begun.