his uneasiness grew momentarily greater.
'I scarcely know her well enough,' he protested, 'to present you. Moreover--'
'But she's smiling at you!' interrupted Deacon eagerly.
His handsome but rather weak face was flushed; he was, as an old clubman had recently said of him, 'so very young.' He lacked the restraint usual in cultured Englishmen, and had the frankly passionate manner which one associates with the South. His uncle, Colonel Deacon, a mordant wit, would say apologetically:
'Reggie' (Deacon's father) 'married a Gascon woman. She was delightfully pretty. Poor Reggie!'
Certainly Rene was impetuous to an embarrassing degree, nor lightly to be thwarted. Boldly meeting the glance of the woman of the amber eyes, he pushed Annesley forward, not troubling to disguise his anxiety to be presented to the tiger-lady. She turned her head languidly, with that wild-animal grace of hers, and unsmiling now, regarded Annesley.
'So you forget me so soon, Mr. Annesley,' she murmured, 'or is it that you play the good shepherd?'
'My dear Madame,' said Annesley, recovering with an effort his wonted sang-froid, 'I was merely endeavouring to calm the rhapsodies of my friend, who seemed disposed to throw himself at your feet in knight-errant fashion.'
'He is a very handsome boy,' murmured Madame; and as the great eyes were turned upon Deacon the carmine lips curved again in the Cleopatrian smile.
She was indeed wonderful, for while she spoke as the woman of the world to the boy, there was nothing maternal in her patronage, and her eyes were twin flambeaux, luring-luring, and her sweet voice was a siren's song.
'May I beg leave to present my friend, Mr. Rene Deacon, Madame de Medici?' said Annesley; and as the two exchanged glances-the boy's a glance of undisguised passionate admiration, the woman's a glance unfathomable-he slightly shrugged his shoulders and stood aside.
There were others in the salon, who, perceiving that the unknown beauty was acquainted with Annesley, began to move from canvas to canvas toward that end of the room where the trio stood. But Madame did not appear anxious to make new acquaintances.
'I have seen quite enough of this very entertaining exhibition,' she said languidly, toying with a great unset emerald which swung by a thin gold chain about her neck. 'Might I entreat you to take pity upon a very lonely woman and return with me to tea?'
Annesley seemed on the point of refusing, when:
'I have acquired a reputed Leonardo,' continued Madame, 'and I wish you to see it.'
There was something so like a command in the words that Deacon stared at his companion in frank surprise. The latter avoided his glance, and:
'Come!' said Madame de Medici.
As of old the great Catherine of her name might have withdrawn with her suite, so now the lady of the tiger skins withdrew from the gallery, the two men following obediently, and one of them at least a happy courtier.
III. TWIN POOLS OF AMBER
THE white-robed Chinese servant entered and placed fresh perfume upon the burning charcoal of the silver incense-burner. As the scented smoke began to rise he withdrew, and a second servant entered, who facially, in dress, in figure and bearing, was a duplicate of the first. This one carried a large tray upon which was set an exquisite porcelain tea-service. He placed the tray upon a low table beside the divan, and in turn withdrew.
Deacon, seated in a great ebony chair, smoked rapidly and nervously-looking about the strangely appointed room with its huge picture of the Madonna, its jade Buddha surmounting a gilded Burmese cabinet, its Persian canopy and Egyptian divan, at the thousand and one costly curiosities which it displayed, at this mingling of East and West, of Christianity and paganism, with a growing wonder.
To one of his blood there was delight, intoxication, in that room; but something of apprehension, too, now grew up within him.
Madame de Medici entered. The garish motor-coat was discarded now, and her supple figure was seen to best advantage in one of those dark silken gowns which she affected, and which had a seeming of the ultra-fashionable because they defied fashion. She held in her hand an orchid, its structure that of an odontoglossum, but of a delicate green colour heavily splashed with scarlet-a weird and unnatural-looking bloom.
Just within the doorway she paused, as Deacon leaped up, and looked at him through the veil of the curved lashes.
'For you,' she said, twirling the blossom between her fingers and gliding toward him with her tigerish step.
He spoke no word, but, face flushed, sought to look into her eyes as she pinned the orchid in the button-hole of his coat. Her hands were flawless in shape and colouring, being beautiful as the sculptured hands preserved in the works of Phidias.
The slight draught occasioned by the opening of the door caused the smoke from the incense-burner to be wafted toward the centre of the room. Like a blue-gray phantom it coiled about the two standing there upon a red and gold Bedouin rug, and the heavy perfume, or the close proximity of this singularly lovely woman, wrought upon the high-strung sensibilities of Deacon to such an extent that he was conscious of a growing faintness.
'Ah! You are not well!' exclaimed Madame with deep concern. 'It is the perfume which that foolish Ah Li has lighted. He forgets that we are in England.'
'Not at all,' protested Deacon faintly, and conscious that he was making a fool of himself. 'I think I have perhaps been overdoing it rather of late. Forgive me if I sit down.'
He sank on the cushioned divan, his heart beating furiously, while Madame touched the little bell, whereupon one of the servants entered.
She spoke in Chinese, pointing to the incense-burner.
Ah Li bowed and removed the censer. As the door softly reclosed:
'You are better?' she whispered, sweetly solicitous, and, seating herself beside Deacon, she laid her hand lightly upon his arm.
'Quite,' he replied hoarsely; 'please do not worry about me. I am wondering what has become of Annesley.'
'Ah, the poor man!' exclaimed Madame, with a silver laugh, and began to busy herself with the teacups. 'He remembered, as he was looking at my new Leonardo, an appointment which he had quite forgotten.'
'I can understand his forgetting anything under the circumstances.'
Madame de Medici raised a tiny cup and bent slightly toward him. He felt that he was losing control of himself, and, averting his eyes, he stooped and smelled the orchid in his buttonhole. Then, accepting the cup, he was about to utter some light commonplace when the faintness returned overwhelmingly, and, hurriedly replacing the cup upon the tray, he fell back among the cushions. The stifling perfume of the place seemed to be choking him.
'Ah, poor boy! You are really not at all well. How sorry I am!'
The sweet tones reached him as from a great distance; but as one dying in the desert turns his face toward the distant oasis, Deacon turned weakly to the speaker. She placed one fair arm behind his head, pillowing him, and with a peacock fan which had lain amid the cushions fanned his face. The strange scene
