“She is like you, Demetrius, and she has always been my favourite,” she murmured.
His only answer was to take her hand in his, and raise it to his lips.
“I return to Rome next week, but I take back with me a living picture, the incarnation of a dream.”
Claudia was sipping the cup of tea that Frank had procured for her, when she bethought herself that she had not yet seen Patricia.
“Have you seen Pat? It is not humanly possible that she has tucked herself in a corner!”
His eyes were hungrily devouring her face, and lingering on her lips, so that she had the pleasant sensation of a secret caress. Mrs. Jacobs! How ridiculous!
“I saw her disappear half an hour ago in a conspirator-like manner with Mr. Colin Paton, into that room over there.”
He pointed to a closed door, which was the door of the library.
“Nonsense. What have they got to conspire about?”
There was a little frown between her brows. Colin was _her_ friend.
“Why do men and women usually conspire to be alone together?”
Without answering, Claudia crossed the hall, and abruptly turned the handle of the library-door.
Seated close together, talking very earnestly, Pat more excited than she had ever seen her, were the two whom Frank had seen disappear half an hour before. As a matter of fact, it had only been ten minutes, but Frank had always had his doubts of Colin’s friendship.
“ ... bushels of apples and immense quantities of ...” Pat was saying, when her sister came in. “Oh! Claudia, you have come. We’d almost given you up.”
In an utterly different style from her own, Patricia was looking most attractive that afternoon. She had on a soft white charmeuse gown, which showed the long lines of her figure, and clung around her in a manner calculated to send her admirers crazy. The cool nonchalant look which she usually wore had given place to something more intense, more human. Something seemed to have aroused her from her virginal slumber, and is not that brightness in the eyes, that flush on the cheek, generally aroused by a male? Claudia took all this in at a glance, and it was not till afterwards that she had time to reflect on the odd subject-matter of their earnest conversation.
“I wondered where you were,” said Claudia, rather frigidly. “How do you do, Colin? I think mother wants you, Pat.” It was a fib, but she had to explain her entrance.