Alpha Book

Do you think I
was educated for this?--for the wife of a chevalier of industry--"
"M-Mrs. Ruthven!" he gasped; but she was absolutely reckless now--and
beneath it all, perhaps, lay a certainty of the boy's honour. She knew
he was to be trusted--was the safest receptacle for wrath so long
repressed. She let prudence go with a parting and vindictive slap, and
opened her heart to the astounded boy. The tempest lasted a few seconds;
then she ended as abruptly as she began.
To him she had always been what a pretty young matron usually is to a
well-bred but hare-brained youth just untethered. Their acquaintance
had been for him a combination of charming experiences diluted with
gratitude for her interest and a harmless _soupcon_ of sentimentality.
In her particular case, however, there was a little something more--a
hint of the forbidden--a troubled enjoyment, because he knew, of course,
that Mrs. Ruthven was on no footing at all with the Gerards. So in her
friendship he savoured a piquancy not at all distasteful to a very young
man's palate.


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