"There are some things which go without it," said De Chauxville.

"Ah?" looking lazily back at him over her shoulder.

"Yes."

He was cautious, for he was fighting on a field which women may rightly
claim for their own. He really loved Etta. He was trying to gauge the
meaning of a little change in her tone toward him--a change so subtle
that few men could have detected it. But Claude de Chauxville
--accomplished steersman through the shoals of human nature,
especially through those very pronounced shoals who call themselves
women of the world--Claude de Chauxville knew the value of the slightest
change of manner, should that change manifest itself more than once.

The ring of indifference, or something dangerously near it, in Etta's
voice had first been noticeable the previous evening, and the attache
knew it. It had been in her voice whenever she spoke to him then. It was
there now.

"Some things," he continued, in a voice she had never heard before, for
this man was innately artificial, "which a woman usually knows before
they are told to her."

"What sort of things, M. le Baron?"

He gave a little laugh. It was so strange a thing to him to be sincere
that he felt awkward and abashed. He was surprised at his own sincerity.

"That I love you--hum. You have known it long?"

The face which he could not see was not quite the face of a good woman.
Etta was smiling.

"No--o," she almost whispered.

"I think you must have known it," he corrected suavely. "Will you do me
the honor of becoming my wife?"

It was very correctly done, Claude de Chauxville had regained control
over himself. He was able to think about the riches which were evidently
hers. But through the thought he loved the woman.

The lady lowered the feather screen which she was holding between her
face and the fire. Regardless of the imminent danger in which she was
placing her complexion, she studied the glowing cinders for some
moments, weighing something or some persons in her mind.

"No, my friend," she answered in French, at length.

The baron's face was drawn and white. Beneath his trim black mustache
there was a momentary gleam of sharp white teeth as he bit his lip.

He came nearer to her, leaning one hand on the back of her chair,
looking down. He could only see the beautifully dressed hair, the
clean-cut profile. She continued to look into the fire, conscious of the
hand close to her shoulder.

"No, my friend," she repeated. "