The Streets of Ascalon

"Don't be absurd, Mr. Quarren!"

"Absurdity is the badge of all our Guild – "

"What Guild do you belong to?"

"The associated order of ardent suitors – "

"Mr. Quarren! You are becoming ridiculous; do you know it?"

"No, I don't realise it, but they say all the rest of the world considers suitors ridiculous – "

"Do you expect me to listen to such nonsense at such an hour in the morning?"

"It's half past twelve; and my weak solution of nonsense is suitable to the time of day – "

"Am I to understand that the solution becomes stronger as the day advances?"

"Exactly; the solution becomes so concentrated and powerful that traces of common-sense begin to appear – "

"I didn't notice any last night."

"Van Dyne interfered."

"Poor Mr. Van Dyne. If you'd been civil to him he might have asked you to the dance to-night – if I had suggested it. But you were horridly rude."

"I? Rude?"

"You're not going to be rude enough to say it was I who behaved badly to him, are you? Oh, the shocking vanity of man! No doubt you are thinking that it was I who, serpent-like, whispered temptation into your innocent ear, and drew you away into a corner, and shoved palms in front of us, and brought silver and fine linen, and rare fruits and sparkling wines; and paid shameless court with an intelligent weather-eye always on the watch for a flouted and justly indignant cavalier!"

"Yes," he said, "you did all those things. And now you're trying to evade the results."

"What are the results?"

"A partly demented young man clamouring to see you at high-noon while the cold cruel cause of his lunacy looks on and laughs."

"I'm afraid that young man must continue to clamour," she said, immensely amused at the picture he drew. "How far away is he at this moment?"

"In the Legation, a blithering wreck."

"Why not in his office frantically immersed in vast business enterprises and cataclysmic speculations?"

"I'm rather afraid that if business immerses him too completely he will be found drowned some day."

"You promised —said that you were going to begin a vigorous campaign," she reminded him reproachfully. "I asked it of you; and you agreed."

"I am beginning life anew – or trying to – by seeking the perennial source of daily spiritual and mundane inspiration – "

"Why won't you be serious?"

"I am. Were you not the source of my new inspiration? Last night did something or other to me – I am not yet perfectly sure what it was. I want to see you to be sure – if only for a – moment – merely to satisfy myself that you are real – "

"Will one moment be enough?"

"Certainly."

"One second – or half a one?"

"Plenty."

"Very well – if you promise not to expect or ask for more than that – "

"That is terribly nice of you!"

"It is, overwhelmingly. But really I don't know whether I am nice or merely weak-minded. Because I've lingered here gossiping so long with you that I've simply got to fly like a mad creature about my dressing. Good-bye – "

"Shall I come up immediately?"

"Of course not! I expect to be dressing for hours and hours – figuratively speaking… Perhaps you might start in ten minutes if you are coming in a taxi."

"You are an angel – "

"That is not telephone vernacular… And perhaps you had better be prompt, because Mrs. Lannis is coming for me – that is, if you have anything to – to say – that – "

She flushed up, annoyed at her own stupidity, then felt grateful to him as he answered lightly:

"Of course; she might misunderstand our informality. Shall I see you in half an hour?"

"If I can manage it," she said.

She managed it, somehow. At first, really indifferent, and not very much amused, the talk with him had gradually aroused in her the same interest and pleasurable curiosity that she had experienced in exchanging badinage with him the night before. Now she really wanted to see him, and she took enough trouble about it to set her deft maid flying about her offices.

First a fragrant precursor of his advent arrived in the shape of a great bunch of winter violets; and her maid fastened them to her black fox muff. Then the distant door-bell sounded; and in an extraordinarily short space of time, wearing her pretty fur hat, her boa, and carrying a muff that matched both, with his violets pinned to it, she entered the dim drawing-room, halting just beyond the threshold.

"Are you not ashamed," she said, severely, "to come battering at my door at this hour of the day?"

"Abjectly."

They exchanged a brief handshake; she seated herself on the arm of a sofa; he stood before the unlighted fireplace, looking at her with a half smiling half curious air which made her laugh outright.

"Bien! C'est moi, monsieur," she said. "Me voici! C'est moi-même!"

"I believe you are real after all," he admitted.

"Do I seem different?"

"Yes – and no."

"How am I different?"