"I said, what am I to do if Mr. James R. Smythe comes along and orders me out?" Val repeated.
"That's what I thought you said," replied the girl, meeting his admiring, quizzical eyes with a somewhat bewildered yet defensive gaze. "But—why should you say it to me?"
"Isn't that rather hard-hearted of you?" asked Loveland.
"I don't understand you at all," said the girl. "You look like a gentleman, so I suppose you can't mean to be rude or impertinent. But if not, you seem to be talking nonsense."
This was straightforward, to say the least, yet her voice was so sweet and girlish, with such a dainty little drawl in it, that the rebuke did not sound as severe as if spoken with sharper accents.
"Of course I don't mean to be rude or impertinent," Loveland defended himself, at a loss for the next move in the game. "But I thought—that is, I mean—you know, that is my chair. I'm delighted you should have it——"
"Your chair?" echoed the girl. "Oh, you are mistaken. No wonder, if you thought that I—but even then, you couldn't have dreamed I'd take it on purpose?"
"No—o, I——" began Loveland, looking guilty.
Her eyes were on him. "You did think so!" she exclaimed. "I see you did. That was why you—and yet I don't see how you could have fancied I should know who you were, unless—Are you a very famous person in the life to which it's pleased London to call you?"
Lord Loveland laughed rather foolishly. But he reddened a little, which made him look boyish, so that the foolishness was rather engaging.