If _she_ had seen it! Whereupon, a new set of images displaced the first. He was in the ballroom again, he had her hand in his; her charming face with its small features and its beautiful eyes was turned to him. How they danced, and how deliriously the music ran! And there was Falloden in the doorway, with his dark face,—looking on. The rag on his part, had been mere revenge; not for the speech, but for the ball.
Was she in love with him? Impossible! How could such a hard, proud being attract her? If she did marry him he would crush and wither her. Yet of course girls did do—every day—such idiotic things. And he thought uncomfortably of a look he had surprised in her face, as he and she were sitting in the New Quad under the trees and Falloden passed with a handsome dark lady—one of the London visitors. It had been something involuntary—a flash from the girl’s inmost self. It had chilled and checked him as he sat by her. Yet the next dance had driven all recollection of it away.
“She can’t ever care for me,” he thought despairingly. “I know that. I’m not her equal. I should be a fool to dream of it. But if she’s going to throw herself away—to break her heart for that fellow—it’s—it’s devilish! Why aren’t we in Paris—or Warsaw—where I could call him out?”
He tossed about in pain and fever, irritably deciding that his bandage hurt him, and he must recall the doctor, when he heard Sorell’s voice at the door. It quieted him at once.
“Oh, there was a bit of a row last night. We were larking round the fountain, trying to push each other in, and I cut my hand on one of those rotten old pipes. Beastly luck! But Fanning’s done everything. I shall be all right directly. There’s a little bone broken.”
“A bone broken!—your hand!” ejaculated Sorell, who sat down and looked at him in dismay.
“Yes—I wish it had been my foot! But it doesn’t matter. That kind of thing gets well quickly, doesn’t it?” He eyed his visitor anxiously. “You see I never was really ill in my life.”
“Well, we can’t run any risks about it,” said Sorell decidedly. “I shall go and see Fanning. If there’s any doubt about it, I shall carry you up to London, and get one of the crack surgeons to come and look at it. What was the row about?”