Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/201

 "Sssh!" O'Rourke warned him. .

"Ah, monsieur, but I am desolated to have hurt you!" said Chambret contritely; for he had at once recognized the pain that sprang to new life in the Irishman's eyes.

"No matter at all, Chambret. Sure, 'tis always with me." O'Rourke laughed, but hollowly. "'Tis not in the O'Rourke to be forgetting her highness—nor do I wish to, to be frank wid ye. Faith …" He forgot to finish his thought and lapsed into a dreamy silence, staring into the smoke rings. His face was turned away for the moment, but one fancied that he saw again the eyes of Madame la Princesse.

"But why, then—" persisted Chambret.

"Have ye not stated it, yourself—the reason why the thing's impossible, me friend? The wealthiest woman in all France, since the death of that poor fool, her brother! Is she to be mating with a penniless Irish adventurer, a—a fortune-hunter? Faith, then, 'twill not be with the O'Rourke that she does it!"

"But I thought—" Chambret persisted.

"That I loved her? Faith, ye were right, there, old friend! 'Tis me life I'd be giving for her sweet sake, any time at all 'tis necessary—or convenient." He chuckled shortly, then shook his head with decision. "No more," he said: "'tis over and done with—me dream vanished. Please God, 'tis the O'Rourke here who will be going back to her some one of these fine mornings, with a pocketful of money and a heart that … If she'll wait so long, which I misdoubt. 'Tis not in woman's nature to live loveless, though Heaven forfend that I should breathe a whisper against her faith and constancy!"

He glared at Chambret wrathfully, as though he suspected