The Knave of Diamonds | Page 2

plan of action, then, boldly but quite quietly,
he pushed the door back and entered.
He was a slight, trim man, clean-shaven, with high cheek-bones that
made a long jaw seem the leaner by contrast. His sleek black hair was
parted in the middle above his swarthy face, giving an unmistakably
foreign touch to his appearance. His tread was light and wary as a cat's.
His eyes swept the room comprehensively as he advanced, coming
back to the woman at the window as though magnetically drawn to her.
But she remained quite unaware of him, and he, no whit disconcerted,
calmly seated himself at one of the tables behind her and took up a
pack of cards.
The dance-music in the room below was uproariously gay. Some of the
dancers were singing. Now and then a man's voice bellowed through
the clamour like the blare of a bull.
Whenever this happened, the man at the table smiled to himself a faint,
thin-lipped smile, and the woman at the window shivered again.
Suddenly, during a lull, he spoke. He was counting out the cards into
heaps with lightning rapidity, turning up one here and there, and he did
not raise his eyes from his occupation.

"I say, you know," he said in a drawl that was slightly nasal, "you will
have to tell me how old you are. Is that an obstacle?"
She wheeled round at the first deliberate syllable. The electric light
flared upon her pale, proud face. She stood in dead silence, looking at
him.
"You mustn't mind," he said persuasively, still without lifting his eyes.
"I swear I'll never tell. Come now!"
Very quietly she turned and closed the window; then with a certain
stateliness she advanced to the table at which he sat, and stopped before
it.
"I think you are making a mistake," she said, in a voice that had a hint
of girlish sweetness about it despite its formality.
He looked up then with a jerk, and the next instant was on his feet.
"Gad! I'm tremendously sorry! What must you take me for? I took you
for Mrs. Damer. I beg you will forgive me."
She smiled a little, and some of the severity went out of her face. For a
moment that too seemed girlish.
"It is of no consequence. I saw it was a mistake."
"An idiotic mistake!" he declared with emphasis. "And you are not a bit
like Mrs. Damer either. Are you waiting for someone? Would you like
me to clear out?"
"Certainly not. I am going myself."
"Oh, but don't!" he begged her very seriously. "I shall take it horribly to
heart if you do. And really, I don't deserve such a snub as that."
Again she faintly smiled. "I am not feeling malicious, but you are
expecting your partner. And I--"

"No, I am not," he asserted. "My partner has basely deserted me for
another fellow. I came in here merely because I was wandering about
seeking distraction. Please don't go--unless I bore you--in which case
you have only to dismiss me."
She turned her eyes questioningly upon the cards before him. "What are
you doing with them? Is it a game?"
"Won't you sit down?" he said, "and I will tell you."
She seated herself facing him. "Well?"
He considered the cards for a little, his brows bent. Then, "It is a
magician's game," he said. "Let me read your fortune."
She hesitated.
Instantly he looked up. "You are not afraid?"
She met his look, a certain wistfulness in her grey eyes. "Oh, no, not
afraid--only sceptical."
"Only sceptical!" he echoed. "That is a worldwide complaint. But
anyone with imagination can always pretend. You are not good at
pretending?"
"Not particularly."
His eyes challenged hers. "Perhaps you have never needed an
anaesthetic?" he said coolly.
She looked slightly startled. "What do you mean?"
He leaned deliberately forward across the table. "You know what an
anaesthetic does, don't you? It cheats the senses of pain. And a little
humbug does the same for the mind. Of course you don't believe
anything. I don't myself. But you can't stand for ever and contemplate
an abyss of utter ignorance. You must weave a little romance about it
for the sake of your self-respect."

She looked straight into the challenging eyes. The wistfulness was still
in her own. "Then you are offering to weave a little romance for me?"
she said, with a faint involuntary sigh.
He made her a brief bow. "If you will permit me to do so."
"To relieve your boredom?" she suggested with a smile.
"And yours," he smiled back, taking up the cards.
She did not contradict him. She only lowered her eyes to the deft hands
that were disposing the cards in mystic array upon the table.
There