As she stepped out upon the balcony, Deerehurst drew forward the low chair that she had occupied the night before; and she sank into it with a little sigh. For the first time in the glamour of her new-found excitement, she felt glad to escape from the crowd and the lights of the salon.
For a while her companion made no effort to break the silence that she seemed anxious to preserve, then at last he changed his position, stepped softly forward, and laid his hand on the back of her chair.
"Is what Barnard tells me true?" he asked. "Are you really leaving Venice in a week?"
She bent her head without looking up.
"But surely we can persuade you----"
His voice quickened, then broke off, as Clodagh turned to him.
"Does it matter to any one whether I go or stay?" she asked in a slightly tremulous voice.
The only surprise that Deerehurst betrayed, was shown in the narrowing of his cold eyes. He studied her penetratingly for a moment; then he spoke again very quietly.
"Mrs. Milbanke," he said, "can you ask that question in good faith?"
A faint touch of last night"s embarra.s.sment wavered across her mind, but this time she swept it defiantly aside.
"Yes; I mean it."
She turned, and again looked up into his face.
"And am I to answer in good faith?"
She bent her head, still looking at him.
"Then judging by the one case of which I can confidently speak, yes!--distinctly yes!"
There was a pause; and Clodagh gave a faint laugh.
"And whose is the one case?"
Her voice sounded cool, high, even slightly indifferent. It piqued Deerehurst to a further step. He answered her question with another.
"Mrs. Milbanke," he said, "have you ever heard of Circe?"
Again she laughed.
"My education was extensive, if very intermittent," she said. "Yes, I have heard of Circe--and her wild beasts."
He echoed the laugh in his thin, expressive voice.
"I see the implication! But I would willingly play even wild beast--to your Circe!"
He bent over her chair.
She drew away with a slight, sharp movement; but he did not alter his position.
"Do you know that a man would follow you--anywhere?"
"Anywhere?"
"Anywhere."
He let his hand glide softly from the back of the chair to her shoulder.
At the touch of his fingers, she slipped away from him with a noiseless movement, and rose to her feet.
"Then follow me back to the salon!" she said in a voice that still sounded high and light.
There was a constrained pause, but it was one of short duration.
Deerehurst was not the man to be easily taken at a disadvantage. For one instant a glimmering of chagrin showed on his composed face; the next it was gone. He straightened his dignified figure, and felt mechanically for his eyegla.s.s.
""Pon my word!" he said. "I believe you _are_ Circe. Use your prerogative!"
He turned, laughed a little, and indicated the salon with a courtly gesture.
Clodagh looked at him. He puzzled and disconcerted her. To one whose innate instinct was a yielding to impulse, his absolute impa.s.sivity in face of disconcerting situations was something incomprehensible. And now, as he stepped aside to give her pa.s.sage, she gave a quick laugh, expressive of both embarra.s.sment and relief; and crossed the balcony with a certain instinctive haste.
During their absence, the crowd in the salon had increased; the press about the roulette-table had become denser; while at half a dozen card-tables, sheltered from the general gathering by large screens of old Italian leather-work, parties of four were playing bridge.
Ignoring these latter groups, Clodagh crossed the room towards the roulette-table, and paused upon the outskirts of the crowd that surrounded it.
Deerehurst, following her closely, narrowed his eyes with a touch of interest as he saw that, either by intention or accident, she had halted beside Sir Walter Gore.
"Well," he said in his thin, satirical voice, as he gained her side--"well, shall we combine forces as we did last night? I brought you luck, remember!"
She turned upon him almost sharply.
"No!" she said--"no! I don"t play roulette."
At the vehemence of her denial, he raised his eyebrows; and Sir Walter Gore looked round. Seeing the speaker, an involuntary gleam of surprise crossed his face.
"Surely you are not so unfashionable as to disapprove of gambling, Mrs.
Milbanke?" he asked.
Clodagh raised her eyes; and this time her glance was free from coquetry.
"I have not been fashionably brought up," she said.
"Indeed!"
The surprise--and, with it, a reluctant interest--deepened in Gore"s glance. But his eyes wandered doubtfully over her dress.
Invariably quick to follow a train of thought, she gave a short, comprehending laugh.
"Oh, I know what you are thinking of!" she cried. "I don"t look as if I belong to the wilds. People never understand that dressing is a knack that comes to women, and does not really mean anything."