From time to time Paul's eyes would wander around the table; and from
its dainty dishes and exquisite flowers return to their true
lodestone, his hostess. In fact, the girl possessed a mesmeric charm
for him, which had grown with marvelous rapidity since his arrival.
"It is all wonderfully beautiful!" he said, looking straight into
Dorothy's eyes.
"I'm so glad you like it," she answered smiling, "but you're not
eating like a very hungry man."
She was helping his plate to a salad of cresses, to which she was
adding an extra spoonful of dressing.
"I think you will find this quite the correct thing," she added,
pushing the plate toward him.
"Everything is much more than perfect," answered Paul; "in fact, I am
not accustomed----"
But he checked himself suddenly. How did he know what the real Henley
was accustomed to? Possibly he was a millionaire, while he, Paul--was
not.
Whate'er she was doing, in every pose, Miss Guir was a picture--a
quaint, unusual picture, to be sure, but nevertheless a picture. In
helping the fruit which was brought on after dinner, her white hands,
ablaze with precious stones, shone to peculiar advantage; and when
she poured out the coffee that followed, Paul wished for his kodak,
for he had seen nowhere, save in old-fashioned engravings, just such
a picture as she made. But it became Miss Guir's turn to be critical.
"Do you know what I think?" she said, looking him full in the face,
and without a suspicion of embarrassment.
"About what?"
She bent toward him with her elbows on the table, her chin resting
upon her clasped hands.
"I think that if you had a flower in your buttonhole--you wouldn't
mind it now, would you, if I were to give you one?"
And then without either smile or apology, she took the chrysanthemum
from her hair and tossed it over to Paul. There was something so odd,
and yet so deeply earnest in the way the thing was done that Henley
accepted the favor as he might have accepted a command from royalty
than as a flirtatious banter from a girl. He placed the flower in his
buttonhole without the faintest desire to respond with one of those
frivolous speeches he would have used under most similar
circumstances.
Before the meal was finished, Ah Ben entered the room and poured
himself a cup of coffee, which he drank without sitting down. It was
all that he took.