The Cab of the Sleeping Horse Part 36

"Which was?" she asked.

"The evening I met you in Peac.o.c.k Alley. How long then had you been here?"

"Two days!"

"And not a word to me?"

"'Personal feelings do not enter into the diplomatic secret service,'"

she quoted mockingly.

"Precisely," he agreed, "We understand each other and the game."

It served his purpose not to notice the mock in her tones. He very well understood what it imported and what prompted it. For the first time the tigress had disclosed her claws. Hitherto it was always the soft caress and the soothing purr--and when she wished, her caress could be very soft and her purr very soothing. He had a.s.sumed that there were claws, but she had hidden them from him; and what is ever hidden one after a time forgets. And she had some justification for her resentment.

He admitted to himself that his att.i.tude and manner had been such as might cause her to believe that she was more to him than an opponent in a game, that he was about to forgive her past, and to ask her to warrant only for the future. And he had a notion that she was prepared to warrant and to keep the warrant--even as she had done with the Duke of Lotzen. Now it was ended. He knew it.

And she knew it, too. One sight of Mrs. Clephane with him and she realized that he was lost to her: Mrs. Clephane had all her outward grace and beauty, but not her past. Her woman's intuition had told her in the red-room of the Chateau; she knew absolutely when she saw his greeting to Mrs. Clephane in the corridor after her escape. She must go back to her Count de M----, her Cabinet Minister, and her Russian Grand Duke. The only two men she had ever cared for would have none of her, despite her beauty and her fascination. Dalberg ever had scorned her; Harleston had looked with favour, wavered, was about to yield, when another--outwardly her _alter ego_, save only in the colour of her hair--appeared and filched him from her. And whether Dalberg's scorn or Harleston's defection was the more humiliating, she did not know.

Together they made a mocking and a desolation of her love and her life.

And as she came to hate with a fierce hatred the Princess whom Dalberg loved, so with an even more bitter hatred she hated Mrs. Clephane who had won Harleston from her. For while with Dalberg she never had the slightest chance, and knew it perfectly, with Harleston there was the bitterness of blasted hopes as well as of defeat.

And Harleston, sitting there beside her, the perfume of her hair and garments heavy about him, read much that was in her thoughts; and some remorse smote him--a little of remorse, that is--and he would have said something in mitigation of her judgment. But a look at her--and the excuse was put aside and the subject ended before it was even begun.

She was not one to accept excuses or to be proffered them, it were best to let the matter rest. Meanwhile, Mrs. Clephane must be warned of the danger confronting her.

He glanced again at her--and met her subtle smile.

"This Mrs. Clephane," she remarked with quiet derision, "wherein is she different from the rest of us?"

"By 'us' you mean whom?" he asked.

"The women you have known."

"And seen?"

"And seen."

"You're exceedingly catholic!" he smiled.

"You're exceedingly exclusive--and precipitate; and you haven't answered my question. Wherein is Mrs. Clephane different from the rest of us?"

"At the risk of being personal," he replied, "I should say that she is very like you in face and figure and manner. If her hair were black, the resemblance would be positively striking."

"Then, since we're on the personal equation, the difference is where?"

He threw up his hands and laughed to avoid the obvious answer, an answer which she knew, and knew he wished to avoid.

"The difference is where?" she repeated.

"I shall let you judge if there is a difference, and if there is, what it is," he replied.

"I wish to know _your_ mind, Mr. Harleston--I already know my own."

"Good girl!" he applauded.

"Please put me aside and consider Mrs. Clephane," she insisted. "Is she cleverer than--well, than I am?"

"You are the cleverest woman that I have ever known."

"Is she more intellectual?"

"Preserve me from the intellectual woman!" he exclaimed.

"Is she more travelled?"

"I think not."

"Is she superficially more cultured?"

"I should say not."

"Has she a better disposition?"

"No one could have a better disposition than you have ever shown to me."

"Is she more fascinating in manner?"

"She couldn't be!"

"She _is_ younger?" tentatively.

Harleston did not reply.

"But very little--two or three years, maybe?" she added.

Again Harleston did not reply.

"Is her conversation more entertaining?" she resumed.

"Impossible!"

"Or more edifying?"

"Excuse me again!" he exclaimed. "Edifying is in the same cla.s.s as intellectual."

"Then all Mrs. Clephane has on me is a few years?"

He nodded.

"Other things don't count with you, I a.s.sume--when they're of the past, and both have been a trifle tinctured."