The Tigress Part 35

"Doesn't that count? Doesn't that mean anything?"

"Of course it means something. It means that I sympathized. You had been suddenly deprived of the kisses of your fiancee, and I felt how you must miss them. My kisses were purely vicarious. You were starving, and in her place--purely in her place--I fed you."

"And after two days you throw me adrift to starve some more." His tone was very plaintive.

"I can't go on indefinitely, don't you know," returned Nina. "I don't see how you can ask it. Besides it's fully time you went back to her and made it all up. After you've made it up you'll be sorry you ever saw me.

My kisses will be on your conscience. You'll feel like telling her, and you won't dare. So--"

"But I shall never make it up. I've said that a dozen times. It's all over and done with forever."

"Then go to her mother. Isn't she kissable?"

"I hate her mother," he groaned.

"How about her father?"

Carleigh drew up his mouth, winked once with both eyes, and stared.

"Are you suggesting that her father might kiss me?" he asked, at length, in highest indignation.

"Oh, dear, no," answered Nina, laughing. "Did it sound like that? I was thinking faster than I talked. I was wondering about her father--her real, own father, I mean. Not the diamond man--not Veynol."

But still he looked at her, a question showing through his eyes.

"Is--is he still alive?"

"You've been reading _British Society_," he charged.

"Was there something in that about him? I swear I haven't seen the nasty rag in years."

"I saw it," he said. "It purported to give the real reason for the breaking off of my engagement. But it wasn't true. What it said I'd never so much as heard."

"What did it say?"

"It slandered Rosamond's father. And I'll not add to the slander by repeating it."

"Oh!" exclaimed Nina. "Then you don't hate the whole family."

But Carleigh made no reply. He shrugged his shoulders and, leaning forward, gazed moodily for a moment at a depending golden globe a half-dozen yards away.

So posed, he was a wistful, pathetic figure, and Nina's heart softened.

"I won't go away," she said; and he looked at her, again pleased.

"You mean--"

"I mean I'll be nice to you for just one week more. If--"

"If--I don't care what the 'if' is, if you'll keep your word."

"If you'll promise to go back to the Veynol girl when the week's over."

"But there's no use," he insisted. "We had very bitter words. She would never consent to see me again. I know she wouldn't."

"I'm not saying she would," Nina argued. "Girls can be very stubborn.

I'm a little like that myself. Still, you can try, you know. It's that I'm asking. Will you promise?"

He looked unutterable things at her--pa.s.sion, love, adoration. "I'd promise to kill myself at the end for a week of your kindness. You can be so divinely adorable, when--you like."

"I don't want you to kill yourself. I want you to have life at his fullest--all that's brightest, and best, and most worthy. I want you to have the happiness to which you're destined."

"I'll have bliss for a week, at all events," he declared, edging closer and reaching for the hand nearest him.

"But bliss is so fleeting," she said. "You must have the joy that lasts." She drew her hand away. "Remember, I shall let you make love to me only on that condition."

He didn't in the least understand, and he told her so.

"Why are you so insistent?" he asked.

"Because I'll only do this wicked thing that good may come of it."

"Wicked thing," he repeated.

"It's wicked to her. She loves you--I'm sure she does. And it isn't right that you should console yourself for a silly little tiff by philandering with me or any other convenient woman."

"It isn't philandering," he cried indignantly. "I love you as I never loved before in my life. I'd marry you to-day if you'd say so."

"But I'm not going to say so to-day or to-morrow or any other day. I don't love you in the least. But it amuses me to play at love, and it salves my conscience when I think it's for a good cause. There! That's the whole story," and she threw him a look that conveyed finality.

He debated mentally for the best part of half a minute before speaking.

Certainly Mrs. Darling was not flattering. He realized that hers was the stronger character.

"Have you always been so particular?" he asked, unable quite to dissemble his vexation.

"That's just it," she answered. "I haven't been. But I'm resolved to turn over a new leaf. I've sent so many to the devil that my heart is set on sending you to--to Heaven instead."

He opened his arms, hungrily and invitingly, and said:

"I promise. I'll take you on your own terms, since that is the only way."

"As a gentleman you can't break your word, you know," she reminded him.

"Hadn't you better wait until after luncheon to think it over?"

"But luncheon won't be served for--"

"Oh, yes, it will," she interrupted. "It's served now. We mustn't set every one talking and gossiping by being late and coming in together."

She was already on her feet, and his arms dropped disconsolately. "I'll go at once, and you can think a while and then follow."

"Just one kiss first," he implored.