Page:Possession (1926).pdf/171

 

HEN at length Ellen became conscious of her surroundings, it was with the faint odor of stables in her nostrils and in her ears the jingling of harness and the steady, brisk clop! clop! made by the hoofs of spirited horses upon wet asphalt. The cabriolet, flitting through the streaks of light made by street lamps on the wet pavement, was passing through an open space where the light shone on the bare branches of trees and banks of wet and dirty snow. Otherwise everything was silent.

When she stirred presently and moved into an upright posture, she saw by her side a mass of sable, the sudden glint of a brilliant yellow dress, captured and fixed by a stray beam of light and then the face and bright lips of the bizarre woman with red hair, who stirred and murmured,

"It's all right. I'm Miss Cane. On the other side is Mr. Callendar . . . Mrs. Callendar's son."

The dark man removed his top hat and bowed. "We're taking you home," he said, "to the Babylon Arms. . . . That's right, isn't it?"

There was a faint trace of accent in his voice. . . vaguely familiar, confused somehow with a memory of mimosa and the figure of Lily standing beneath the glowing Venice in the drawing room of Shane's Castle. The same sort of accent. . ..

"That's right, isn't it?" continued the voice of the dark young man. "The Babylon Arms?"

Then for the first time, Ellen spoke, slowly and with a certain shyness. "Yes. I live there. . . . But how did you know?"

The man laughed. "Two reasons," he said. "First. Sanson told my mother. Second. My mother owns the Babylon Arms."

Again a wandering ray of light flitted across the window of the cabriolet illuminating for an instant the brilliant lips of Miss Cane. The lips were smiling, as if conscious that they were shielded by the darkness, but it was a mocking smile and the mem-