“So soon!”

She saw the blood forsake the bronzed fairness of his face, and leave the dusky pallor there.  It wounded her as if she suffered herself.  For the first time she believed what the Little One had said—­that this man loved her.

“I sent for you,” she continued hurriedly, her graceful languor and tranquillity for the first time stirred and quickened by emotion, almost by embarrassment.  “It was very strange, it was very painful, for me to trust that child with such a message.  But you know us of old; you know we do not forsake our friends for considerations of self-interest or outward semblance.  We act as we deem right; we do not heed untrue constructions.  There are many things I desire to say to you——­”

She paused; he merely bent his head; he could not trust the calmness of his voice in answer.

“First,” she continued, “I must entreat you to allow me to tell Philip what I know.  You cannot conceive how intensely oppressive it becomes to me to have any secret from him.  I never concealed so much as a thought from my brother in all my life, and to evade even a mute question from his brave, frank eyes makes me feel a traitress to him.”

“Anything else,” he muttered.  “Ask me anything else.  For God’s sake, do not let him dream that I live!”

“But why?  You still speak to me in enigmas.  To-morrow, moreover, before we leave, he intends to seek you out as what he thinks you—­a soldier of France.  He is interested by all he hears of your career; he was first interested by what I told him of you when he saw the ivory carvings at my villa.  I asked the little vivandiere to tell you this, but, on second thoughts it seemed best to see you myself once more, as I had promised.”

There was a slow weariness in the utterance of the words.  She had said that she could not reflect on leaving him to such a fate as this of his in Africa without personal suffering, or without an effort to induce him to reconsider his decision to condemn himself to it for evermore.

“That French child,” she went on rapidly, to cover both the pain that she felt and that she dealt, “forced her entrance here in a strange fashion; she wished to see me, I suppose, and to try my courage too.  She is a little brigand, but she had a true and generous nature, and she loves you very loyally.”

“Cigarette?” he asked wearily; his thoughts could not stay for either the pity or interest for her in this moment.  “Oh, no!  I trust not.  I have done nothing to win her love, and she is a fierce little condottiera who disdains all such weakness.  She forced her way in here?  That was unpardonable; but she seems to bear a singular dislike to you.”

“Singular, indeed!  I never saw her until to-day.”

He answered nothing; the conviction stole on him that Cigarette hated her because he loved her.