ing her
dress very high to display a lace-befrilled petticoat, and clattering
gracefully on two high-heeled, pointed shoes. He screwed up his eyes
against the sun, in order to see her better--he was short-sighted, too,
but vanity forbade him to wear glasses--and when, at the corner of the
street, Ephie rather spoilt the effect of her behaviour by throwing a
hasty glance back, he laughed and clicked his tongue against the roof
of his mouth.

"VERDAMMT!" he said with expression.

And both on that day and the next, when he admired a well-turned ankle
or a pretty petticoat, he was reminded of the provoking little
American, with the tossed head and baby mouth.

A few days later, in the street that ran alongside the Gewandhaus, he
saw her again.

Ephie, who, in the interval, had upbraided herself incessantly, was
none the less, now the moment had come, about to pass as before--even
more frigidly. But this time Schilsky raised his hat, with a tentative
smile, and, in order not to appear childish, she bowed ever so
slightly. When he was safely past, she could not resist giving a
furtive look behind her, and at precisely the same moment, he turned,
too. In spite of her trouble, Ephic found the coincidence droll; she
tittered, and he saw it, although she immediately laid the back of her
hand on her lips. It was not in him to let this pass unnoticed. With a
few quick steps, he was at her side.

He took off his hat again, and looked at her not quite sure how to
begin.

"I am happy to see you have not forgotten me," he said in excellent
English.

Ephie had impulsively stopped on hearing him come up with her, and now,
colouring deeply, tried to dig a hole in the pavement with the toe of
her shoe. She, too, could not think what to say; and this, together
with the effect produced on her by his peculiar lisp, made her feel
very uncomfortable. She was painfully conscious of his insistent eyes
on her face, as he waited for her to speak; but there was a distressing
pause before he added: "And sorry to see you are still angry with me."

At this, she found her tongue. Looking, not at him, but at a passer-by
on the opposite side of the street, she said: "Why, I guess I have a
right to be."

She tried to speak severely, but her voice quavered, and once more the
young man was not sure whether the trembling of her lip signified tears
or laughter.

"Are you always so cruel?" he asked, with an intentness that made her
eyes seek the