“You’re not!” he challenged her. “And even if you were, you surely wouldn’t deny me after I’ve come all the way from Paris to see you?”
After all, she decided, there’s no use in running away. I’ll face it now and get it over with. And then I’ll not see him again.
“Why did you leave so suddenly without giving me—us—a chance to see you again?” he demanded not unkindly when they had given their order.
“I finished my work and decided I was tired of Paris and wanted to get home.”
He said nothing but in his eyes she read his thoughts—she had not succeeded in deceiving him. The consciousness he knew her fear gave him an advantage that made her uncomfortable.
“Tell me about Mrs. Crosby. ‘The dear old Behemoth,’ you called her, I believe,” she sought to divert him.
“She’s still buying junk—and Horace is howling louder than ever. They’ll have to charter a ship to get the stuff home. Tell me, did I do anything that offended you?”
“Why do you ask me such a foolish question?”
“You ran away,” he answered simply.
“No, you didn’t do anything to offend me. And I didn’t run away. I just came home when my work was done.”
“I asked at the hotel and they said you had engaged your room through the fifteenth. And the Behemoth took me to Paquin’s and Beer’s and Worth’s and Drecoll’s and they all said you told them you’d had a cable calling you back to the States. And the steamship people told