Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/40

 Beauty and mystery combined were befuddling the Irish- man sadly; when she ceased, looking to him for an answer, he strove to recall her words.

"Monsieur Chambret?" he iterated vaguely. Then, to himself, in a flash of comprehension: "The password, 'To the Gare du Nord'!"

"Mais oui!" she cried, impatiently tapping the floor with the little slipper. "Chambret—who else? Oh!" She sat forward abruptly, her eyes wide with dismay. "You must be from Monsieur Chambret? There cannot have been any mistake?"

For a second O'Rourke was tempted to try to brazen it out; to lie, to invent, to make her believe him indeed from this "Monsieur Chambret." But to his credit be it, the thought was no sooner conceived than abandoned. Somehow, he felt that he might not he to this woman and retain his self-respect.

Not that alone, but now that he could see more clearly her eyes, he fancied that he perceived evidences of mental anguish in their sweet depths; she seemed to have been counting dearly on his being the man she had expected. No—he must be frank with her. "I fear," he admitted sadly, "that there is a mistake, mademoiselle. In truth, I'm not from your friend; ye were right when ye fancied me a fugitive. I was running away— to avoid arrest for an offense that was not wholly mine: I had been strongly provoked. I saw the fiacre, supposed it empty, of course, jumped in … Ye understand? Believe me, I sincerely regret deceiving ye, mademoiselle, even unintentionally."

He waited, but she made no answer; she had drawn away from him as far as the fiacre would permit, and now sat