"I am glad if you keep a semblance even of good manners."
"Manners?" he said reflectively. "I dimly remember having had something of the kind in my youth, but I long since threw them aside. I thought them out of fashion."
"Is that the reason you have not asked me to sit down?"
"I did not know as you would stay long enough to make it an object."
"I can go, of course, if you wish it."
"Don't on my account, I beg," he said coolly. "I am charmed to have you here. I should have invited you, had I supposed you'd accept."
"You have, hundreds of times."
"Have I? We say so many of those things for politeness' sake, and forget them instantly."
She tossed her head, and took up the book he had been reading.