Page:Wilson - The Boss of Little Arcady (1905).djvu/200

 hidden guilt I handled the minute coffee cup awkwardly. Clem, who must have been equally nervous, stepped to right the thing in its saucer, with "Yes, seh, Mahstah Majah!"

From across the table I knew, without raising my eyes, that his mistress glanced up at Clem in quick astonishment, then that her eyes were fastened upon my face. I still regarded the coffee interestedly, but I knew that I myself blushed now and I suspected that my hostess was pale.

"Major?" she began questioningly, then more decidedly, "Major Blake?"

I raised my eyes to hers and nodded idiotically.

She laughed a little laugh that was icy in its politeness.

"How stupid of me, and now I must ask your pardon for all my tirade, for my blasphemies, and for that monstrous toast I—really—"

She shot a look at Clem, under which he blanched visibly, then her eyes were again upon me and she smiled with a rare art.

"Really, you will overlook an old woman's weakness."

It was the inimical, remote, icy superiority of her tone that nettled me—perhaps her implied assumption that I would not know it for such. But also I felt curiously stricken by that swift withdrawal of her confidence, for Mrs. Caroline Lansdale had won me by her laugh and blush of ancient girlishness. Further, I would not now be hurt by any woman,