Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/36



Saints," prayed Terence devoutly, "preserve us all!"

Immediately he felt himself stricken as with a dumbness—fairly stunned. The woman upon whose privacy he had so unceremoniously intruded, composedly and with a pretty grace made a place for him by her side; and he, obedient, but speechless, collapsed into the seat.

It came to him that this must be an exceptionally wonderful manner of woman, who could accept his rude invasion with such unruffled calmness; and he had noted that her voice was not only absolutely unmoved, but most marvelously sweet to hear.

The fiacre whirled on as though the devil himself were at the whip (thought O'Rourke). It rocked from side to side, perilously upon one or two or three wheels—never safely upon four; it sheered about corners, scraping the curbs barely.

Conversation became obviously impossible under such circumstances; O'Rourke recognized the necessity of explanations, but found that he must perforce be silent; and, for that matter, he was rather grateful for the chance to get his breath and collect his scattered wits.

So he abandoned as hopeless the task of framing up some plausible excuse for his conduct, as well as that of accounting to himself for the extreme placidity with which his fair neighbor had welcomed him; and, consistently with his character,