"
"Shame on you!" cried my aunt. "An old man like you!"
So things went on. Johnny kept right on coming. My aunt would fume about
it, but she did nothing. We were all under Deolda's enchantment. As for
me, I adored her; she had a look that always disarmed me. She would sit
brooding with a look I had come to know as the "Deolda look." Tears
would come to her eyes and slide down her face.
"Deolda," I would plead, "what are you crying about?"
"Life," she answered.
But I knew that she was crying because Johnny Deutra was only a boy.
Then she would change into a mood of wild gayety, whip the shawl around
her, and dance for me, looking a thousand times more beautiful than
anyone I had ever seen. And then she would shove me out of the room,
leaving me feeling as though I had witnessed some strange rite at once
beautiful and unholy.
She'd sit mocking Conboy, but he'd only smile. She'd go off with her
other love and my aunt powerless to stop her. As for Johnny Deutra, he
was so in love that all he saw was Deolda. I don't believe he ever
thought that she was in earnest about old Conboy.
So things stood when one day Capt. Mark Hammar came driving up with
Conboy to take Deolda out. Mark was his real name, but Nick was what
they called him, after the "Old Nick," for he was a devil if there ever
was one, a big, rollicking devil--that is, outwardly.
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