The Englishman at his table made pretence to eat his supper, poured himself out a fresh glass of champagne, drank it, and with a suddenly achieved decision, gave a cool laugh of excuse, rose and walked straight toward the solitary figure.
Max, momentarily _clairvoyant_, felt the violent heartbeat, the caught breath, that told the woman of his presence--felt to a nicety the control of her expression, the rigidity of her body, as she slowly raised her head and met his eyes; then he saw the man bow, making some suggestion, and he leaned back in his seat with a little sigh of satisfaction as the woman smiled and rose and the two began to dance.
Both tall above the ordinary, they were a well-suited couple, and a certain pleasure filled the beholder's mind as they moved decorously up and down the long aisle formed by the double row of tables--the man entirely indifferent to his surroundings, dancing in this Parisian supper-place precisely as he would have danced in a London ball-room; the woman following his every movement with a passivity--a oneness--that gave no hint of the definite purpose at work within her brain.
The dance over, he led her back to her table, drew her chair forward with elaborate politeness, bowed and, with a murmured word, strolled back to his own table.
So sure had been her triumph, so abrupt its collapse, that Max--smoking his cigarette, sipping his coffee--turned, with a little exclamation, to Blake.
"Have you observed, _mon ami_? Oh, why was that?"
"'Twould be hard to say," he answered, meditatively. "In a matter of emotion, an Englishman has a way of getting frightened of himself. This particular specimen has come over to Paris to play--and he doesn't fancy fire for a toy!"
"And what will happen? What will be the end?" Max had laid his cigarette aside; his fingers were interlaced, sure sign that his emotions were running high; and his eyes, when he fixed them on Blake's, held a touch of their rare sombre fire.
"How will it end, you say? Guess, my child!"
"Well, boy, Eve will be Eve to the end of time--and Adam will be Adam!"
This last was called forth by the rising from table of the trio--the quiet passing from the room of the fair man in the train of his friend and the little dark lady.