“You look beautiful,” he declared.  “I suppose you know that.  I suppose they’ve all been telling you so.”

She shook her head.

“They haven’t all your courage, dear Briton,” she remarked, “and if they did tell me so, I am not sure that I should be convinced.  You see, most of my friends have lived so long and lived so quickly that they have learned to play with words until one never knows whether the things they speak come from their hearts.  With you it is different.”

“Yes,” Tavernake admitted, “with me it is different!”

She glanced at the clock.

“Well,” she said, “you have seen me and I am glad to have seen you, and you may kiss my fingers if you like, and then you must run away.  I am engaged to have supper with my friends downstairs.”

He raised her fingers clumsily enough to his lips and kept them there for a moment.  When he let them go, she wrung them as though in pain, and looked at him.  She turned abruptly away.  In a sense she was disappointed.  After all, he was an easy victim!

“Elise,” she called out, “my cloak.”

Her maid came hurrying from the next room.  Elizabeth turned towards her, holding out her shoulders.  She nodded to Tavernake.

“You know the way down, Mr. Tavernake?  I shall see you again soon, sha’n’t I?  Good-night!”

She scarcely glanced at him as she sent him away, yet Tavernake walked on air.

CHAPTER XIV

A warning from Mr. Pritchard

Tavernake hesitated for a moment under the portico of the Milan Court, looking out at the rain which had suddenly commenced to descend.  He scarcely noticed that he had a companion until the man who was standing by his side addressed him.

“Say, your name is Tavernake, isn’t it?”

Tavernake, who had been on the point of striding away, turned sharply around.  The man who had spoken to him was wearing morning clothes of dark gray tweed and a soft Homburg hat.  His complexion was a little sallow and he was clean-shaven except for a slight black moustache.  He was smoking a black cigar and his accent was transatlantic.  Something about his appearance struck Tavernake as being vaguely familiar, but he could not at first recall where he had seen him before.

“That is my name, certainly,” Tavernake admitted.

“I am going to ask you a somewhat impertinent question,” his neighbor remarked.

“I suppose you can ask it,” Tavernake rejoined.  “I am not obliged to answer, am I?”

The man smiled.

“Come,” he said, “that’s honest, at any rate.  Are you in a hurry for a few minutes?”

“I am in no particular hurry,” Tavernake answered.  “What do you want?”

“A few nights ago,” the stranger continued, lowering his voice a little, “I met you with a young lady whose appearance, for some reason which we needn’t go into, interested me.  To-night I happened to overhear you inquiring, only a few minutes ago, for the sister of the same young lady.”