Page:Temple Bailey--The Gay cockade.djvu/37

 end. She did not know how, in all the years, his wife had molded him.

When he had satisfied the crowd, Jimmie fought his way to where Elise and Duncan and I stood together.

Elise was wrapped in a great cloak of silver brocade. There was a touch of silver, too, in her hair. But she had never seemed to me so small, so childish.

"Oh, Jimmie," she said, as he came up, "you've done it!"

"Yes"—he was flushed and laughing, his head held high—"you always said I could do it. And I shall do it again. Did you hear them shout, Elise?"

"Yes."

"Jove! I feel like the old woman in the nursery rhyme, 'Alack-a-daisy, do this be I? He was excited, eager, but it was not the old eagerness. There was an avidity, a greediness.

She laid her hand on his arm. "You've earned a rest, dearest. Let's go up in the hills."

"In the hills? Oh, we're too old, Elise."

"We'll grow young."

"To-night I've given youth to the world. That's enough for me"—the light in his eyes was not for her—"that's enough for me. We'll hang around New York for a week or two, and then we'll go 31