Frankness? Honesty? True; but these qualities, when too strongly observable, are suspect because they may be assumed. It may have been that she completely lacked coquetry; never thought of it, never noticed herself; though she was undeniably pretty and her rounded body, in the oyster-coloured evening-gown, was far from unnoticeable as she sat coiled on the sofa.
The light, smoke-misted, glistened on her light-brown hair. She rested one elbow on the arm of the sofa, her arm straight up, fingers turning over a cigarette that had gone out. When she changed her position, the light altered the complexion of her face and shoulders from pale to pink to pale. Her straight-forward eyes, dark-brown, regarded Stannard deprecatingly.
"I only said—" she began again.
"Let me put the case to you."
"Oh, my lord of the law!"
"My dear Ruth, it's not necessary to mock at me."
Ruth Callice was genuinely astonished. She sat up. "Stan! I never thought any such thing!"
"Never mind," chuckled John Stannard, K. C.
He had one of those heavy voices, roughened into what for him was unjustly called a whisky-voice, which can make any statement sound abrupt. Thick-bodied, not overly tall, he picked up his cigar and settled back in the easy-chair. Out of a roundish face, roughened like his voice, the brilliant black eyes peered sardonically. Though he had reddened during those remarks with Ruth, this may have been a matter of the drinks.
"A man dies," Stannard went on, after a gust of cigar-smoke.' "His soul is heavy with evil; with spiritual poison; call it what you like. He may die a natural death; more probably, he commits suicide or is killed. In any case—"