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The Captain's suspicions came to a point like a setter. He began sniffing about for Cissie's motives in choosing so queer an ornament. He wondered if it had anything to do with Peter Siner. All his life, Captain Renfrew's brain had been deliberate. He moved mentally, as he did physically, with dignity.
Cissie's wish was gratified, for on Saturday morning Miss Lincoln gave the welcome announcement that she had decided the picnic should be at Moorcliffe on the following Thursday, provided that the weather was favourable, and that no unforeseen event occurred in the meantime. "Miss Lincoln always puts in a warning note of that kind," said Enid. "I wonder what she expects to happen.
Every one was planning how to help Cissie, how to make her present state more endurable. They were the black folk, the unfortunate of the earth, and the pride of righteousness is only to the well placed and the untempted. Presently Nan came back with a bundle of Cissie's clothes.
The customer made garment had found Cissie's body of richer mold than it had been designed to shield. And yet in Peter's distress and tenderness and embarrassment, this little rent held his attention and somehow misprized the wearer. It seemed symbolic in the searching white light. He could see the very break in the thread and the widened stitches at the ends of the rip.
Were such revenges possible? Would people presently begin to murder the makers of the Great War? What a strange thing it would be in history if so there came a punishment and end to the folly of kings! Only a little while ago Cissie's imagination might have been captured by so romantic a dream. She was still but a year or so out of the stage of melodrama. But she was out of it.
Miss Williams fairly gnashed her teeth with envy, and left the hall shortly after ten o'clock, disgusted with that thing from the telegraph office, while the gentlemen eagerly sought for an introduction to the acknowledged belle of the ball-room. Miss Smith was as proud of Cissie's success as if it had been her own.
His tone unconsciously patronized Cissie's prettiness with the patronage of the male for the less significant thing, as though her ripeness for love and passion and children were, after all, not comparable with what he, a male, could do in the way of significantly molding life. Cissie lifted her head and dried her eyes. "So you aren't going to marry me, Peter?"
He recalled with a certain satisfaction that he had not said a word of condemnation the night of Cissie's confession. He would make a point of that, and was prepared to argue that, since he had said nothing, he meant nothing.
All this philosophy aside, Cissie's appearance just in the nick of his inspiration, her surprising proposal of marriage, and his refusal, had accomplished one thing: it had committed Peter to the program he had outlined to the girl. Indeed, there seemed something fatalistic in such a concatenation of events.
Cissie moved toward the window and undid the latch. "Good night, Peter." She paused a moment, with her hand on the catch. "Peter," she said, "I'd almost rather see you marry some other girl than try so terrible a thing." The big, full-blooded athlete smiled faintly. "You seem perfectly sure marriage would cure me of my mission." Cissie's face reddened faintly. "I think so," she said briefly.
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