Van Tassel did not know whether to gather courage or alarm from her silence as they sat there side by side. The gondoliers slowly propelled the boat, keeping in view of the fountains’ tossing banners of liquid light.
"Tell me what you are thinking, Mildred," he urged, at last.
"I am not thinking. Do you ever come to such times? I do always in this spot. Perhaps it is because I have no thoughts to match such unearthly beauty. At all events I never think, here. I feel. I absorb."
"Give me the Peristyle," said Mildred, "and what I can see from it, and sweep all the rest of the Fair away if you like. I don’t love many things in this world beside Mildred Bryant, but the Peristyle is one of them."
It was a novel speech from her, and in a novel tone. The low cadence of her voice had lost the laughter or imperiousness which usually characterized it.
Jack was silent for a time. "Are you warm enough?" he asked at last.
"Yes; but I think we had better go home."
"Oh, certainly, and it was very kind of you, Jack, to take so much trouble."
This gentleness alarmed Van Tassel more than any amount of coldness or impertinence would have done; but he fought off dejection.
"I have given you one thing, then, that you can’t hand on to Clover," he said lightly.
The fountains leaped a last time and fell, dropping lower and lower, till only the white sea foaming about Columbia’s barge was left. Soft radiance again lit up water and sculpture.
Mildred longed to be at home; and soon she and Jack entered a wagonette at the Park gate and were driven to the house. When they arrived, the orchestra at the hotel was playing the music of Carmen.
"There is a delicate compliment to you, Jack," she suggested, as they ascended the steps.
"Yes; but must you go right in?" for she showed symptoms of leaving him.
"It has been a long day," she answered, lingering with an unusual gentle compliance from which he gathered no hope.
"You are tired," he said, with tender contrition. "I have had you so long, and yet—when should I be ready to let you go! Oh, Mildred,—is it any use?" he burst forth suddenly, in a low tone, seizing both her hands and holding them with painful tightness.
A fluttering and wild, loud peeping came from the tangle of vines near which they stood, and a small dark object half fell, half flew down past their heads to the grass below.