Page:Under three flags; a story of mystery (IA underthreeflagss00tayliala).pdf/111

 house, spends money freely, and seems to be drifting through existence with the insouciance of a man who has lived his life and who looks forward to nothing this side of Charon's ferry—or perhaps beyond.

He plays at cards and plunges at the track and wins or loses with the inevitable composure which characterizes his every action. To men he is cold, often insolent; to women he is indifferent, although infinitely courteous. Handsome, distingue, wealthy, witty in a dry, cynical sort of way, he is a man who could be immensely popular with his fellows and fascinating to the other sex. That he is neither one nor the other is his peculiarity.

His companion of this evening, Isabel Harding, is a personage, who would attract instant attention in a crowd of attractive women. She is magnificently proportioned—a splendid animal, as Van Zandt remarked when first his careless gaze rested upon her. Her hair is black as midnight; her eyes, large and lustrous, can either flash with the fury of the tiger or beam with the softness of the dove. Her mouth is somewhat large, but it is firm, and between full, scarlet lips gleam two arcs of strong, milk-white teeth.

She has known occasions when propriety was not finically insisted upon, but on this night she is as demure as innocence at 16. For she knows Van Zandt well enough to understand that, while virtue and worth may not interest him, viciousness and unworthiness decidedly do not. And the least discerning student of human nature can see that she loves him—loves him blindly, madly, and—hopelessly.

Van Zandt cares nothing for her, save in his indifferent way, and she knows it. But she does not despair. She is a woman.

Somewhere in Bohemia, Van Zandt met Isabel Harding. She interested him, she was so unlike the other women at the little French restaurant where he had dropped in to get lunch and a bottle of really good wine. Some small service by him rendered sufficed to establish between the two a camaraderie that continued until the present. It witnessed no alteration of sentiment on