To him she represented nothing more than a doll with brains, from whose
intelligence he had profited, but of whose beauty he was weary.
"You know what our poet says, Nita," he reminded her. "'Love is like the
rustling of the wind in the almond trees before dawn.' We cannot command
it. It comes to us or leaves us without reason."
She looked across the auditorium once more and spoke with her head
turned away from her companion.
"There is no one in the East," she said, "because those who write me
weekly send news of my lord's doings. There is no one in the East,
because there they give the body who know nothing of the soul. And so my
Prince is safe amongst them. But here--these western women have other
gifts. Is that she, master of my life and soul?"
"I met her this evening for the first time," he replied.
She laughed drearily.
"Eyes may meet in the street without speech, a glance may burn its way
into the soul. Once I thought that I might love again, because a
stranger smiled at me in the Bois, and he had grey eyes, and that look
about his mouth which a woman craves for. He passed on, and I forgot.
You see, my lord was still there.--So this is the woman."
"Who knows?" he answered.
Immelan came into the box a little abruptly. There was a cloud upon his
face which he did his best to conceal. Almost simultaneously, a
messenger from behind the scenes arrived for Nita. She rose to her feet
and wrapped her green cloak closely around her lissom figure.
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