"With your permission," said Boots at her shoulder in a very low voice.
She looked up, surprised, her eyes still wet. Then comprehending the
compliment of his attendance, acknowledged it with a faint smile.
"Good-night," he said to Nina. Then he took Rosamund down to her
brougham with a silent formality that touched her present sentimental
mood.
She leaned from her carriage-window, looking at him where he stood, hat
in hand, in the thickly falling snow.
"Please--without ceremony, Mr. Lansing." And, as he covered himself,
"May I not drop you at your destination?"
"Thank you"--in refusal.
"I thank you for being nice to me. . . . Please believe there is often
less malice than perversity in me. I--I have a heart, Mr. Lansing--such
as it is. And often those I torment most I care for most. It was so with
Alixe. Good-bye."
Boots's salute was admirably formal; then he went on through the
thickening snow, swung vigorously across the Avenue to the Park-wall,
and, turning south, continued on parallel to it under the naked trees.
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