THE SACRED FOUNT
obliged. You deserve," she continued to me, "that I should say the gentleman's own face is the image of a certain other gentleman's."
"It isn't the image of yours," Obert said to me, fitting the cap, "but it's a funny thing that it should really recall to one some face among us here, on this occasion—I mean some face in our party—that I can't think of." We had our eyes again on the ominous figure. "We've seen him yesterday—we've seen him already this morning." Obert, oddly enough, still couldn't catch it. "Who the deuce is it?"
"I know," I returned after a moment—our friend's reference having again, in a flash, become illuminating. "But nothing would induce me to tell."
"If I were the flattered individual," Long observed, speaking for the first time, "I've an idea that you'd give me the benefit of the compliment. Therefore it's probably not me."
"Oh, it's not you in the least," Mrs. Server blandly took upon herself to observe. "This face is so bad———"
"And mine is so good?" our companion laughed. "Thank you for saving me!"
I watched them look at each other, for there had been as yet between them no complete exchange. Yes, they were natural. I couldn't have made it out that they were not. But there was something,
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