"Oh! Come! Don't say that," Mr. Brown besought her, cheerily. "Course you will. All girls say they'll never marry, and all girls do, after all. All the pretty——All the ones like you, I'm sure."
"I shan't," persisted Olwen, a trifle cheered however. "I'm not pretty."
"Oh! Who's fishing for compliments?" laughed Mr. Brown. He jerked the other arm into his coat and began to fasten it. "If you don't mind me saying so, you're the prettiest girl in the place by miles. You are. I'm not the only person in the hotel who thinks so, either."
"Aren't you?" said Olwen, with a lift of her head, and of her heart. "Who——?"
"Why that old boy who keeps the hotel; old Leroux. He said you were 'très jolie' the other day, when you were passing the steps. I said 'wee, wee, très.' You've got such ripping eyes."
"I don't think they're anything," said Olwen, disconsolate again.
"They are," insisted little Mr. Brown, his pink, ordinary face becoming dignified by his sincerity. "And it's not only—not only that you've got a lovely little face. There's—well, I don't know what there is about it."
"A charm, perhaps," suggested Olwen, with would-be irony; but he took up quite gravely: "That's it! Just what I meant. A charm. One sort of feels glad there is the kind of think walking about. It's like the song
'When we was in the trenches
Fighting beside the Frenchies,
We'd 'a' given all we 'ad for a girl like 'er,
Wouldn't we, Bill?
Aye!'
Or something of that sort. Really now. Seriously. It is awfully topping to know there is a girl like you!"