The professor nods his head. The awful vista she has opened up to him has completely deprived him of speech.
"Ah! yes," sighs she, taking that deceitful nod in perfect good faith. "And you would have been good to me too, and let me look in at the shop windows. I should have taken such _care_ of you, and made your tea for you, just," sadly, "as I used to do for poor papa, and----"
It is becoming too much for the professor.
It is a week later when he meets her again. The season is now at its height, and some stray wave of life casting the professor into a fashionable thoroughfare, he there finds he.
Marching along, as usual, with his head in the air, and his thoughts in the ages when dates were unknown, a soft, eager voice calling his name brings him back to the fact that he is walking up Bond Street.
In a carriage, exceedingly well appointed, and with her face wreathed in smiles, and one hand impulsively extended, sits Perpetua. Evidently the owner of the carriage is in the shop making purchases, whilst Perpetua sits without, awaiting her.
"Were you going to cut me?" cries she. "What luck to meet you here. I am having such a _lovely_ day. Mrs. Constans has taken me out with her, and I am to dine with her, and go with her to a concert in the evening."
She has poured it all out, all her good news in a breath, as though sure of a sympathetic listener.
He is too good a listener. He is listening so hard, he is looking so intensely, that he forgets to speak, and Perpetua's sudden gaiety forsakes her. Is he angry? Does he think----?
"It's _only_ a concert," says she, flushing and hesitating. "Do you think that one should not go to a concert when----"
"Yes?" questions the professor abstractedly, as she comes to a full stop. He has never seen her dressed like this before. She is all in black to be sure, but _such_ black, and her air! She looks quite the little heiress, like a little queen indeed--radiant, lovely.
"_Well_--when one is in mourning," says she somewhat impatiently, the color once again dyeing her cheek. Quick tears have sprung to her eyes. They seem to hurt the professor.
"One cannot be in mourning always," says he slowly. His manner is still unfortunate.
"You evade the question," says she frowning. "But a concert _isn't_ like a ball, is it?"