As she spoke, an expression of rapture, that was like light, illumined the girl's face for an instant, bright as a flash of sunshine on a white bird's wing. But it passed, and her eyes darkened with some quick memory of pain. She looked down, thick black lashes shadowing her cheeks.
"By Jove!" I thought. "There's a _story_ here!"
Robert Lorillard wrote that Miss Arnold was "perfect." Yet he had sent her away. He said he was going away himself. But I felt sure he wasn't. Or else, he was going on purpose. He had _searched the newspapers to find a place for her_. If he hadn't done that deliberately, he would never have seen my advertisement.
And she? The girl was breaking her heart at the loss of her "Paradise."
Joyce Arnold was ready to begin work at once.
She had, it seemed, already given up her lodgings in the village near Robert Lorillard's cottage. Opal Fawcett had offered the hospitality of her house for a fortnight, and while there Joyce would pay her way by writing Opal's letters in spare hours, the newest secretary being absent on holiday. In the meantime, now that it was decided she should come to me, Miss Arnold would look for rooms somewhere in my neighbourhood.
I let it go at this for a few days. But when just half a week had passed I realized that Joyce Arnold wasn't merely a perfect secretary, she was a perfect companion as well. Not perfect in a horrid, "high-brow" way, but simply adorable to have in the house.
It was on a Wednesday that she brought me Lorillard's letter. On the following Saturday, at luncheon, I suddenly said, "Look here, Miss Arnold, how would you like to live with me instead of in lodgings?"
She blushed with surprise. (She blushed easily and beautifully.)
"Why, I--should love it, of course," she stammered, "if you're really sure that you----"
"Of course I'm sure," I cut her short. "What I'm beginning to wonder is, how I ever got on without you!"
"You've known me only three days and a half! And----"
"Long enough to be sure that you're absolutely IT," said I. "If already you seem to me indispensable, how _could_ Robert Lorillard have made up his mind to part with you, after _months_?"
I didn't mean to be cruel or inquisitorial. The words sprang out--spoke themselves. But I could have boxed my own ears when I saw their effect on the girl. She grew red, then white, and tears gushed to her eyes. They didn't fall, because she was afraid to wink, and stared me steadily in the face, hoping the salt lake might safely soak back. All the same I saw that I'd struck a hard blow.