Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/48

 this adventurer; at present, he was impossible—too earnest, too willing to serve, too fervent for comfort.

For a time she did not speak, and the room was very quiet. If she watched him, O'Rourke was unable to make certain of it; for the upper half of her face was in deep shadow. Only her arms, bared, showed very white and rounded; O'Rourke might not keep his gaze from them.

But she found a way to bring him to his senses. Suddenly she leaned forward, and turned the shade of the lamp so that its glare fell full upon the Irishman's face; her gaze then became direct; and, resting her elbows upon the table, lacing her fingers and cradling her chin upon the backs of her hands, the girl boldly challenged him.

"Colonel O'Rourke," she said deliberately—at once to the point; "you are to consider that this is a matter of business, purely."

He flushed, drew himself bolt upright.

"Pardon!" he murmured stiffly.

"Granted, monsieur," she replied briskly. "And now, before we implicate ourselves, let us become acquainted. You, I already know, I believe."

"Yes, madame?"

"There was a man of whom I have heard, of the name of O'Rourke, who served as a colonel in the Foreign Legion in the Soudan, for a number of years."

"The same, madame," he said—not-without a touch of pride in his tones.

"He received the decoration of the Legion of Honor, I believe? For gallantry?"

"They called it such, madame."

He turned aside the lapel of his coal; she nodded, her eyes