She qualified her surrender, of course, by sitting on the very edge of the chair. She had on a wine-colored dress, and, with the excitement whipping color into her cheeks and her eyes dancing, Nelly Lebrun was a lovely picture.
"I must go at once," said Nelly.
"Of course, I can't expect you to stay."
She dropped one hand on the edge of the table. One would have thought that she was in the very act of rising.
"Do you know that you frighten me?"
"I?" said Donnegan, with appropriate inflection.
"As if I were a man and you were angry."
"But you see?" And he made a gesture with both of his palms turned up. "People have slandered me. I am harmless."
"The minute is up, Mr. Donnegan. What is it you wish?"
"Another minute."
"Now you laugh at me."
"No, no!"
"And in the next minute?"
"I hope to persuade you to stay till the third minute."
"Of course, I can't."
"I know; it's impossible."
"Quite." She settled into the chair. "See how people stare at me! They remember poor Jack Landis and they think--the whole crowd--"
"A crowd is always foolish. In the meantime, I'm happy."
"You?"
"To be here; to sit close to you; to watch you."
Her glance was like the tip of a rapier, searching him through for some iota of seriousness under this banter.
"Ah?" and Nelly Lebrun laughed.
"Don't you see that I mean it?"
"You can watch me from a distance, Mr. Donnegan."
"May I say a bold thing?"
"You have said several."
"No one can really watch you from a distance."
She canted her head a little to one side; such an encounter of personal quips was a seventh heaven to her.
"That's a riddle, Mr. Donnegan."
"A simple one. The answer is, because there's too much to watch."
He joined her when she laughed, but the laughter of Donnegan made not a sound, and he broke in on her mirth suddenly.
"Ah, don't you see I'm serious?"
Her glance flicked on either side, as though she feared someone might have read his lips.
"Not a soul can hear me," murmured Donnegan, "and I'm going to be bolder still, and tell you the truth."
"It's the last thing I dare stay to hear."
"You are too lovely to watch from a distance, Nelly Lebrun."
He was so direct that even Nelly Lebrun, expert in flirtations, was given pause, and became sober. She shook her head and raised a cautioning finger. But Donnegan was not shaken.
"Because there is a glamour about a beautiful girl," he said gravely. "One has to step into the halo to see her, to know her. Are you contented to look at a flower from a distance? That's an old comparison, isn't it? But there is something like a fragrance about you, Nelly Lebrun. Don't be afraid. No one can hear; no one shall ever dream I've said such bold things to you. In the meantime, we have a truth party. There is a fragrance, I say. It must be breathed. There is a glow which must touch one. As it touches me now, you see?"
Indeed, there was a faint color in his cheeks. And the girl flushed more deeply; her eyes were still bright, but they no longer sharpened to such a penetrating point. She was believing at least a little part of what he said, and her disbelief only heightened her joy in what was real in this strangest of lovemakings.
"I shall stay here to learn one thing," she said. "What deviltry is behind all this talk, Mr. Donnegan?"
"Is that fair to me? Besides, I only follow a beaten trail in The Corner."
"And that?"
"Toward Nelly Lebrun."
"A beaten trail? You?" she cried, with just a touch of anger. "I'm not a child, Mr. Donnegan!"
"You are not; and that's why I am frank."
"You have done all these things--following this trail you speak of?"
"Remember," said Donnegan soberly. "What have I done?"
"Shot down two men; played like an actor on a stage a couple of times at least, if I must be blunt; hunted danger like--like a reckless madman; dared all The Corner to cross you; flaunted the red rag in the face of the bull. Those are a few things you have done, sir! And all on one trail? That trail you spoke of?"
"Nelly Lebrun--"
"I'm listening; and do you know I'm persuading myself to believe you?"
"It's because you feel the truth before I speak it. Truth speaks for itself, you know."
"I have closed my eyes--you see? I have stepped into a masquerade. Now you can talk."
"Masquerades are exciting," murmured Donnegan.
"And they are sometimes beautiful."
"But this sober truth of mine--"
"Well?"
"I came here unknown--and I saw you, Nelly Lebrun."
He paused; she was looking a little past him.
"I came in rags; no friends; no following. And I saw that I should have to make you notice me."
"And why? No, I shouldn't have asked that."
"You shouldn't ask that," agreed Donnegan. "But I saw you the queen of The Corner, worshiped by all men. What could I do? I am not rich. I am not big. You see?"
He drew her attention to his smallness with a flush which never failed to touch the face of Donnegan when he thought of his size; and he seemed to swell and grow greater in the very instant she glanced at him.
"What could I do? One thing; fight. I have fought. I fought to get the eye of The Corner, but most of all to attract your attention. I came closer to you. I saw that one man blocked the way--mostly. I decided to brush him aside. How?"
"By fighting?" She had not been carried away by his argument. She was watching him like a lynx every moment.
"Not by that. By bluffing. You see, I was not fool enough to think that you would--particularly notice a fighting bully."
He laid his open hand on the table. It was like exposing both strength and weakness; and into such a trap it would have been a singularly hard-minded woman who might not have stepped. Nelly Lebrun leaned a little closer. She forgot to criticize.
"It was bluff. I saw that Landis was big and good-looking. And what was I beside him? Nothing. I could only hope that he was hollow; yellow--you see? So I tried the bluff. You know about it. The clock, and all that claptrap. But Landis wasn't yellow. He didn't crumble. He lasted long enough to call my bluff, and I had to shoot in self-defense. And then, when he lay on the floor, I saw that I had failed."
"Failed?"
He lowered his eyes for fear that she would catch the glitter of them.
"I knew that you would hate me for what I had done because I had only proved that Landis was a brave youngster with enough nerve for nine out of ten. And I came tonight--to ask you to forgive me. No, not that--only to ask you to understand. Do you?"
He raised his glance suddenly at that, and their eyes met with one of these electric shocks which will go tingling through two people. And when the lips of Nelly Lebrun parted a little, he knew that she was in the trap. He closed his hand that lay on the table--curling the fingers slowly. In that way he expressed all his exultation.
"There is something wrong," said the girl, in a tone of one who argues with herself. "It's all too logical to be real."
"Ah?"
"Was that your only reason for fighting Jack Landis?"
"Do I have to confess even that?"
She smiled in the triumph of her penetration, but it was a brief, unhappy smile. One might have thought that she would have been glad to be deceived.
"I came to serve a girl who was unhappy," said Donnegan. "Her fiancé had left her; her fiancé was Jack Landis. And she's now in a hut up the hill waiting for him. And I thought that if I ruined him in your eyes he'd go back to a girl who wouldn't care so much about bravery. Who'd forgive him for having left her. But you see what a fool I was and how clumsily I worked? My bluff failed, and I only wounded him, put him in your house, under your care, where he'll be happiest, and where there'll never be a chance for this girl to get him back."
Nelly Lebrun, with her folded hands under her chin, studied him.
"Mr. Donnegan," she said, "I wish I knew whether you are the most chivalrous, self-sacrificing of men, or simply the most gorgeous liar in the desert."
"And it's hardly fair," said Donnegan, "to expect me to tell you that."
