"You see?"
"In your eyes."
"You saw that?"
"Yes, you were wondering how I came to be praying--probably for money--to St. Joseph--praying in an old blue serge suit that looked as if a little money could easily be spent on it, and yet can afford to sit out here in the morning in Kensington Gardens and tell you what you are so good as to call a delightful little story?"
"That's quite true. I was wondering that."
"And I," said John, "have been wondering just the same about you."
What might not such a conversation as this have led to? They were just beginning to tread upon that virgin soil from which any fruit may be born. It is a wonderful moment that, the moment when two personalities just touch. You can feel the contact tingling to the tips of your fingers.
What might they not have talked of then? She might even have told him why she was praying to St. Joseph, but then the master mariner returned, bearing papers in his hand.
"Are you one Thomas Grey?" said he.
"I am that man," replied John.
"These are secret papers which I am to deliver into your hands. There is a fortune to be made if you keep secret."
John took the short story.
"Secrecy shall be observed," said he.
CHAPTER VIII
THE FATEFUL TICKET-PUNCHER
The master of the good ship _Albatross_ departed, chartered for another voyage to the Port of Lagos with his cargo of gravel, gathered with the sweat of the brow and the tearing of the finger nails from the paths in Kensington Gardens.
John hid the short story away and lit a cigarette. She watched him take it loose from his waistcoat pocket. Had he no cigarette case? She watched him take a match--loose also--from the ticket pocket of his coat. Had he no match-box? She watched him strike it upon the sole of his boot, believing all the time that he was unaware of the direction of her eyes.
But he knew. He knew well enough, and took as long over the business as it was possible to be. When the apprehension of discovery made her turn her head, he threw the match away. Well, it was a waste of time then.
"I thought," said she presently, "you had told me your name was John?"
"So it is."
"Then why did you tell Ronald to deliver the papers to Thomas Grey?"
"That is my father."
"And does he live in Venice?"
What a wonderful thing is curiosity in other people, when you yourself are only too ready to divulge! Loth only to tell her it all too quickly, John readily answered all she asked.
"Yes, he lives in Venice," he replied.
"Always?"
"Always now."
She gazed into a distance of her own--that distance in which nearly every woman lives.
"What a wonderful place it must be to live in," said she.
He turned his head to look at her.
"You've never been there?"
"Never."
"Ah! there's a day in your life yet then."
Her forehead wrinkled. Ah, it may not sound pretty, but it was. The daintiest things in life are not to be written in a sentence. You get them sometimes in a single word; but oh, that word is so hard to find.
"How do you mean?" she asked.
"The day you go to Venice--if ever you do go--will be one day quite by itself in your life. You will be alive that day."
"You love it?"
She knew he did. That was the attraction in asking the question--to hear him say so. There is that in the voice of one confessing to the emotion--for whatever object it may happen to be--which can thrill the ear of a sensitive listener. A sense of envy comes tingling with it.
It is the note in the voice, perhaps. You may hear it sometimes in the throat of a singer--that note which means the passion, the love of something, and something within you thrills in answer to it.
"You love it?" she repeated.
"I know it," replied John--"that's more than loving."
"What does your father do there?"
"He's an artist--but he does very little work now. He's too old. His heart is weak, also."
"Then does he live there by himself?"
"Oh, no--my mother lives with him. They have wonderful old rooms in the Palazzo Capello in the Rio Marin. She is old, too. Well--she's over sixty. They didn't marry until she was forty. And he's about ten years older than she is."
"Are you the only child?"
"The only child--yes."
"How is it that they didn't marry until your mother was forty?"
She pattered on with her questions. Having accepted him as a friend, the next thing to do was to get to know all about him. It is just as well, in case people should ask; but in this huddle of houses where one knows more of the life of one's next-door neighbour than one ever does of one's friends, it really scarcely matters. She thought she wanted to know because she ought to know. But that was not it at all. She had to know. She was meant to know. There is a difference.