She turned suddenly. The young man who had called her took her two hands and kissed them one after the other with tender gallantry, and while she bent her head with a smile he kissed her eyes with a soft caress.
“It is a little late,” he said, excusing himself.
“It wants a quarter of an hour to ten,” replied Maria precisely. He looked at his watch and added--
“Perhaps,” she replied, as if to break off the discussion.
She sat down, and the young man, taking a low chair, his usual seat, placed himself beside her. Taking her hand loosely he began to play a little with her fingers, toying distractedly with the rings with which they were loaded.
“ ..._m’aimes_?” said Maria, in an almost childish French fashion, but in a voice without tone or colour.
“ ..._t’aime_,” he replied childishly, and rather perfunctorily. Having, as it were, accomplished a small preliminary duty of conversation they were silent.
She looked at him, and noticed that he was in evening dress, and in his buttonhole were some carnations which she had given him in the morning. Marco Fiore’s slightly delicate appearance was aided by these garments of society. His person gained freedom from a certain thinness more apparent than real. His face was a little too pallid, with deep-black hair and moustaches; the lips were fresh and strong. The eyes, which were extremely soft, with a fascinating softness, had every now and then something feminine in them. But there was nothing feminine in the gleams of passion which kept crossing them in waves, nor was there anything feminine in the generality of the lines, where firmness and even obstinacy were prominent. Two or three times, to break the silence, he kissed her slender fingers.
“Are you going out, Marco?” she asked in that decided voice of hers, which required a precise and direct reply.
“Yes, for a moment or two.... I am obliged to,” Marco insinuated.
“Yes, the last of the season,” he explained, as if to clear up his obligation for going.
Again there was a silence. Maria sat with her two jewelled hands clasped over her knees among the silken folds of opaque silver, as if in a dream.
“Once upon a time I was a great friend of Lady Clairville.”
Suddenly he repented of the remark. Maria’s large eyes, proud and ardent, were veiled in tears.