Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/214

 "M'sieur is served," she announced loudly.

O'Rourke came to with a little start. "Thank you, me dear," he said, and buried his nose in the froth. "Faith," he added, lowering the vessel, "'tis like wine—or your eyes, darlint." To prove this, he smiled engagingly into those eyes.

She did not appear to resent the compliment, nor his manner. "M'sieur has traveled far?" she would know, standing with lowered lashes, her slender fingers playing diffidently with a fold of her apron.

"Not so far that I'm blinded to your sweet face," he averred. "But 'tis truth for ye that I've covered many a mile since sunrise."

"M'sieur does not come from these parts?"

"From Paris."

Although she stood with her back to the light, and though O'Rourke could distinguish her features but dimly, yet he saw that her eyes widened; and he smiled secretly at her simplicity.

"From Paris, m'sieur? But that is far?"

"Quite far, darlint. But faith, I've no cause for complaint."

"M'sieur means—"? she queried, with naive bewilderment.

"M'sieur," he assured her gallantly, "means that no journey is long that has mam'selle at the end av it."

"Oh, m'sieur!"—protesting.

"Truth—me word for it." And the magnificent O'Rourke put a franc into her hand. "The change," he proclaimed largely, "ye may keep for yourself, little one. And this—ye may keep for me, if ye will."

"M'sieur!"

And though they were deeply shadowed, he could see her