Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/287

 "I'm fair dazed," he expostulated, with a halting laugh. "Ye sent for me to do ye a service—and, sure now, me heart's at your feet, madame. Say what ye wish of me, and—'tis done." He paused, knitting his brows over her baffling secretiveness. Then, "I'm ready, madame," he concluded.

"You promise largely, monsieur."

"Faith, 'tis me nature so to do. For how could I be an Irishman were I of the breed to balk at obstacles?"

At this she laughed outright, and so sincerely that O'Rourke was fain to join her. But, even in the height of her mirth, he fancied he detected an undercurrent of anxiety. Madame, he thought, seemed ever to be listening, to be constantly upon her guard against the unforeseen, the unexpected. She seemed oppressed by a fear; and yet not to know how to voice her apprehension to him upon whom she had called to act as her protector.

So that her next words surprised him, though they sounded as though she brought them out with some difficulty.

"It is very simple, monsieur," she began; and paused, as one at loss for words.

"Simple?" he echoed.

"What I would have of you."

"Then, sure, 'tis me heart ye are thinking of," he protested. "'Tis the simplest, most affectionate one in the world, madame."

But she would not be turned aside from the trend of her worriment. She cast upon him a look almost appealing in its intensity; then hastily averted her face, arose, took a step or two falteringly away, and finally paused with her back to O'Rourke, her face to the lattice, looking out into the desolate court.