"To-morrow? They'll possibly keep that long." "I didn't say to-morrow." "I did." "I'm perfectly aware of the subtle suggestion and subtler flattery, Mr. Quarren." "Then, may I see you to-morrow?" "Utterly impossible--pitiably hopeless. You see I am frank about the heart-rending disappointment it is to me--and must be to you. But after I am awake I am in the hands of Mrs. Lannis. And there's no room for you in that pretty cradle." "The next day, then?" "We're going to Florida for three weeks." "You?" "Molly and Jim and I." "Palm Beach?" "Ultimately." "And then?" "Oh! Have you the effrontery to tell me to my face that you'll be in the same mind about me three weeks hence?" "I have." "Do you expect me to believe you?" "I don't know--what to expect--of you, of myself," he said so quietly that she looked up quickly. "Mr. Quarren! _Are_ you a sentimental man? I had mentally absolved you from _that_ preconception of mine--among other apparently unmerited ideas concerning you." "I suppose you'll arise and flee if I tell you that you're different from other women," he said. "You wouldn't be such an idiot as to tell me that, would you?" "I might be. I'm just beginning to realise my capacity for imbecility. You're different in this way anyhow; no woman ever before induced me to pull a solemn countenance." "I _don't_ induce you! I ask you not to." "I _try_ not to; but, somehow, there's something so--so real about _you_----" "Are you accustomed to foregather with the disembodied?" "I'm beginning to think that my world is rather thickly populated with ghosts--phantoms of a more real world." He looked at her soberly; she had thought him younger than he now seemed. A slight irritation silenced her for a moment, then, impatiently: "You speak cynically and I dislike it. What reason have you to express world-weary sentiments?--you who are young, who probably have never known real sorrow, deep unhappiness! I have little patience with a morbid view of anything, Mr. Quarren. I merely warn you--in the event of your ever desiring to obtain my good graces." "I do desire them." "Then be yourself." "I don't know what I am. I thought I knew. Your advent has disorganised both my complacency and my resignation." "What do you mean?" "Must I answer?" "Of course!" she said, laughing. "Then--the Harlequin who followed you up those stairs, never came down again." "Oh!" she said, unenlightened. "I'm wondering who it was who came down out of that balcony in the wake of the golden dancer," he added. "You and I--you very absurd young man. What are you trying to say?" "I--wonder," he said, smiling, "what I am trying to say." CHAPTER III