The Splendid Folly | Page 8

be two friends
travelling together.
Diana was about to enlighten him when her _vis-à-vis_ leaned forward
hastily.
"Please," he said persuasively, and as she returned no answer he
apparently took her silence for consent, for something passed
unobtrusively from his hand to that of the attendant, and the latter
touched his hat with a smiling--"Right you are, sir! I'll reserve a table

for two."
Diana felt that the acquaintance was progressing rather faster than she
could have wished, but she hardly knew how to check it. Finally she
mustered up courage to say firmly:--
"It must only be if I pay for my own dinner."
"But, of course," he answered courteously, with the slightest tinge of
surprise in his tones, and once again Diana, felt that she had made a
fool of herself and blushed to the tips of her ears.
A faint smile trembled for an instant on his lips, and then, without
apparently noticing her confusion, he began to talk, passing easily from
one subject to another until she had regained her confidence, finally
leading her almost imperceptibly into telling him about herself.
In the middle of dinner she paused, aghast at her own loquacity.
"But what a horrible egotist you must think me!" she exclaimed. "I've
been talking about my own affairs all the time."
"Not at all. I'm interested. This Signor Baroni who is training your
voice--he is the finest teacher in the world. You must have a very
beautiful voice for him to have accepted you as a pupil." There was a
hint of surprise in his tones.
"Oh, no," she hastened to assure him modestly. "I expect it was more
that I had the luck to catch him in a good mood that afternoon."
"And his moods vary considerably, don't they?" he said, smiling as
though at some personal recollection.
"Oh, do you know him?" asked Diana eagerly.
In an instant his face became a blank mask; it was as though a shutter
had descended, blotting out all its vivacious interest.
"I have met him," he responded briefly. Then, turning the subject

adroitly, he went on: "So now you are on your way home for a
well-earned holiday? Your people must be looking forward to seeing
you after so long a time--you have been away a year, didn't you say?"
"Yes, I spent the other two vacations abroad, in Italy, for the sake of
acquiring the language. Signor Baroni"--laughingly--"was
horror-stricken at my Italian, so he insisted. But I have no people--not
really, you know," she continued. "I live with my guardian and his
daughter. Both my parents died when I was quite young."
"You are not very old now," he interjected.
"I'm eighteen," she answered seriously.
"It's a great age," he acknowledged, with equal gravity.
Just then a waiter sped forward and with praiseworthy agility deposited
their coffee on the table without spilling a drop, despite the swaying of
the train, and Diana's fellow-traveller produced his cigarette-case.
"Will you smoke?" he asked.
She looked at the cigarettes longingly.
"Baroni's forbidden me to smoke," she said, hesitating a little. "Do you
think--just one--would hurt my voice?"
The short black lashes flew up, and the light-grey eyes, like a couple of
stars between black clouds, met his in irresistible appeal.
"I'm sure it wouldn't," he replied promptly. "After all, this is just an
hour's playtime that we have snatched out of life. Let's enjoy every
minute of it--we may never meet again."
Diana felt her heart contract in a most unexpected fashion.
"Oh, I hope we shall!" she exclaimed, with ingenuous warmth.
"It is not likely," he returned quietly. He struck a match and held it

while she lit her cigarette, and for an instant their fingers touched. His
teeth came down hard on his under-lip. "No, we mustn't meet again," he
repeated in a low voice.
"Oh, well, you never know," insisted Diana, with cheerful optimism.
"People run up against each other in the most extraordinary fashion.
And I expect we shall, too."
"I don't think so," he said. "If I thought that we should--" He broke off
abruptly, frowning.
"Why, I don't believe you want to meet me again!" exclaimed Diana,
with a note in her voice like that of a hurt child.
"Oh, for that!" He shrugged his shoulders. "If we could have what we
wanted in this world! Though, I mustn't complain--I have had this hour.
And I wanted it!" he added, with a sudden intensity.
"So much that you propose to make it last you for the remainder of
your life?"--smiling.
"It will have to," he answered grimly.
After dinner they made their way back from the restaurant car to their
compartment, and noticing that she looked rather white and tired, he
suggested that she should tuck herself up on the seat and go