"
"But people count, Monsieur-Valmond."
She hesitated before the name, as if trying to remember, though she
recalled perfectly. It was her tiny fashion to pique, to appear
unknowing.
"Truly, Madame Chalice," he answered instantly, for he did not yield to
the temptation to pause before her name; "but sometimes the few are as
important to us as the many--eh?"
She almost started at the eh, for it broke in grimly upon the gentlemanly
flavour of his speech.
"If my reasons for coming were only as good as madame's--" he added.
"Who knows!" she said, with her eyes resting idly on his flowered
waistcoat, and dropping to the incongruous enamelled knee-boots with
their red tassels. She turned to the Cure again, but not till Valmond had
added:
"Or the same--who knows?"
Again she looked at him with drooping eyelids and a slight smile so full
of acid possibilities that De la Riviere drew in a sibilant breath of
delight. Her movement had been as towards an impertinence; but as she
caught Valmond's eye, something in it, so really boylike, earnest, and
free from insolence, met hers, that, with a little way she had, she laid
back her head slowly, her lips parted in a sweet, ambiguous smile, her
eyes dwelt on him with a humorous interest, or flash of purpose, and she
said softly:
"Nobody knows--eh?"
She could not resist the delicate malice of the exclamation, she imitated
the gaucherie so delightfully.
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