His strong fingers closed round it possessively and she
was aware of a queer, breathless feeling of captivity. She drew her hand
sharply away.
"Is it a 'kind deed'?" she asked lightly, for the sake of saying
something--anything--which should break the tension of the silence which
had followed.
"Is it not? To bestow a charming half-hour of your companionship on the
loneliest person in Montricheux? Oh, I think so."
"You didn't look at all lonely this afternoon," flashed back Ann,
remembering the pretty woman with whom she had seen him driving.
"At the Battle of Flowers, you mean? No." He turned the conversation
adroitly. "But I only won third prize, so I'm still in need of sympathy.
Taking the third prize is rather my _metier_ in life."
"Perhaps it's all you deserve," she suggested unkindly. "Anyway, you've
nothing to grumble at. _We_ didn't win anything. We weren't elaborately
enough decorated to compete."
"Yet you looked as if you were enjoying it all," he hazarded. "Did you?"
"Yes, of course I did. Didn't you?"
"Not particularly--till some one threw me a rose."
Ann decided to ignore the latter part of this speech.
"You're such a confirmed cynic that I wonder you condescended to take part
in anything go frivolous as the fete," she observed.
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