You
may have seen it in the papers. The flowers alone cost two thousand
dollars."
She had mentioned fifteen years. Fifteen years is a long time.
"Would it be too late," I asked, somewhat timorously, "to offer you
congratulations?"
"Not if you dare do it," she answered, with such fine intrepidity that
I was silent, and began to crease patterns on the cloth with my thumb
nail.
"Tell me one thing," she said, leaning toward me rather eagerly--"a
thing I have wanted to know for many years--just from a woman's
curiosity, of course--have you ever dared since that night to touch,
smell or look at white roses--at white roses wet with rain and dew?"
I took a sip of _creme de menthe_.
"It would be useless, I suppose," I said, with a sigh, "for me to repeat
that I have no recollection at all about these things. My memory is
completely at fault. I need not say how much I regret it."
The lady rested her arms upon the table, and again her eyes disdained
my words and went traveling by their own route direct to my soul. She
laughed softly, with a strange quality in the sound--it was a laugh of
happiness--yes, and of content--and of misery. I tried to look away from
her.
"You lie, Elwyn Bellford," she breathed, blissfully.
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