If she expected to disconcert him, she was disappointed. He informed her at length as to the health, appearance, and conjugal felicity of Mrs. Rossiter.
"They're actually pulling it off," he said interestedly. "They're making a go of it. I've always had the theory that once a divorcée always a divorcée--the old-fashioned gentlewoman is more to my taste. Divorce always seems to me so--so unnecessary--But in this case it appears I am mistaken, and nobody is happier to admit it. They positively fancy each other, Philemon and Baucis, all that sort of thing!--By the way, I had no idea you had made such friends with May. You gave her my bracelet, it seems. Cruel of you, Joan!"
"Did it hurt your feelings?" she murmured, dimpling.
"Oh, frightfully. How did you have the heart? She positively gloated over me."
"Father would never have allowed me to accept anything so handsome from a passing acquaintance. One had to do something with it, you see, so--"
"Passing acquaintance!" he interrupted, reproachfully. "Surely I was more to you than that? Our evening under the beech-tree--shall I ever forget it?"
Joan, paling a little, remarked, "Sister Veronica appears interested."
"Damn!" muttered Eduard, and shortly took his leave. But first he gave her a note from Mrs. Desmond urging her to dine with them on any evening she cared to name.
"Betty is abroad," wrote Mrs. Desmond, "and I know you have no heart for gaieties just now, so there will be only the four of us, a family party."
"Of course we all realize that you are not in a mood for gaiety," said Eduard with a sympathetic glance at her black. "But I _must_ see you somehow!--and among old friends, who understand--"
To ward off any mention of things that hurt, she hastily agreed to dine with the Desmonds on the following Saturday.
Sister Veronica, (who happened to be quite deaf) wondered what could have occurred to give the poor child such an expression of--not exactly pleasure. It was more like triumph. She would have made no sense of what Joan was muttering under her breath, Salome-wise, as she left the parlor: "Off with his head! Oh, off with his head, _and step on it_!"
Not only the older girls, but more than one of the nuns, made some excuse to come into Joan's little room when she was dressing that Saturday evening. The rumor had gone forth that their charge was beginning to take interest in worldly affairs again, and the good ladies congratulated each other. While they themselves had forsworn the pleasures of the world, they were quite aware that for some these had their uses, if only as an anodyne. They took, too, a quite feminine pleasure in Joan's frock, a simple black chiffon with transparent sleeves, which she had cut out a little at the neck to make it suitable for the evening.