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It was a cold, quick air to which they emerged and Alonzo, daring to look at her, found that she had pulled the veil down over her face, the colour of which, in the keen wind, was like that of June roses seen through morning mists. At the curb a long, low, rakish black motor-car was in waiting, the driver a mere swaddled cylinder of fur.

Truslow, opening the little door of the tonneau, offered his hand to the lady. “Come over to the club, Senator, and lunch with me,” he said. “Mrs. Protheroe won’t mind dropping us there on her way.”

That was an eerie ride for Alonzo, whose feet were falling upon strange places. His pulses jumped and his eyes swam with the tears of unlawful speed, but his big ungloved hand tingled not with the cold so much as with the touch of that divine grey fur upon his little finger.

“You intend to make many speeches, Mr. Truslow tells me,” he heard the rich voice saying.

“Yes ma’am,” he summoned himself to answer. “I expect I will. Yes ma’am.” He paused, and then repeated, “Yes ma’am.”

She looked at him for a moment. “But you will do some work, too, won’t you?” she asked slowly.

Her intention in this passed by Alonzo at the time. “Yes ma’am,” he answered. “The committee work interests me greatly, especially drains and dikes.”

“I have heard,” she said, as if searching his opinion, “that almost as much is accomplished in the committee-rooms as on the floor? There–and in the lobby and in the hotels and clubs?”

“I don’t have much to do with that!” he returned quickly. “I guess none of them lobbyists will get much out of me! I even sent back all their railroad tickets. They needn’t come near me!”

After a pause which she may have filled with unexpressed admiration, she ventured, almost timidly: “Do you remember that it was said that Napoleon once attributed the secret of his power over other men to one quality?”

“I am an admirer of Napoleon,” returned the Senator from Stackpole. “I admire all great men.”

“He said that he held men by his reserve.”

“It can be done,” observed Alonzo, and stopped, feeling that it was more reserved to add nothing to the sentence.

“But I suppose that such a policy,” she smiled upon him inquiringly, “wouldn’t have helped him much with women?”

“No,” he agreed immediately. “My opinion is that a man ought to tell a good woman everything. What is more sacred than–“

The car, turning a corner much too quickly, performed a gymnastic squirm about an unexpected street-car and the speech ended in a gasp, as Alonzo, not of his own volition, half rose and pressed his cheek closely against hers. Instantaneous as it was, his heart leaped violently, but not with fear. Could all the things of his life that had seemed beautiful have been compressed into one instant, it would not have brought him even the suggestion of the wild shock of joy of that one, wherein he knew the glamorous perfume of Mrs. Protheroe’s brown hair and felt her cold cheek firm against his, with only the grey veil between.

“I’m afraid this driver of mine will kill me some day,” she said, laughing and composedly straightening her hat. “Do you care for big machines?”

“Yes ma’am,” he answered huskily. “I haven’t been in many.”

“Then I’ll take you again,” said Mrs. Protheroe. “If you like I’ll come down to the State house and take you out for a run in the country.”

“When?” said the lost young man, staring at her with his mouth open. “When?”

“Saturday afternoon if you like. I’ll be there at two.”

They were in front of the club and Truslow had already jumped out. Mrs. Protheroe gave him her hand and they exchanged a glance significant of something more than a friendly goodbye. Indeed, one might have hazarded that there was something almost businesslike about it. The confused Senator from Stackpole, climbing out reluctantly, observed it not, nor could he have understood, even if he had seen, that delicate signal which passed between his two companions.