"Why! you ought to be away up in the country somewhere, out of this sweltering heat," was his first remark after ordinary conventionalities. She observed him coldly and assured him that she was perfectly well. Her invitation to come into the verandah and take a chair was polite, but lacking in enthusiasm. But it was hard to daunt Charles Bramham when he was looking for sensations. Besides which, he felt a genuine and chivalrous interest in this desperate-eyed girl.
"This climate is only meant for flies and Kaffirs," he said pleasantly. "It's quite unfit for white men in summer—to say nothing of a delicate English girl unaccustomed to it."
A smile flickered across Poppy's lips at this description of herself, and Bramham, encouraged by his success, went on to tell her about just the ideal spot for her to recover her health.
"At the Intombi, near Port Shepstone," he said, "you can stand on hills that undulate to the sea five hundred feet below, with the whole veldt between brilliant with flowers."
Poppy looked with surprise into the keen, strong face. She believed Bramham must be a lawyer, because he had such a scrutinising, business-like look about him. But to her astonishment he went on to tell her of a valley where arum-lilies grew in such masses that they looked like miles of snowdrifts lying on the grass.
"All along the south coast," he continued, warming to his subject, "there are thousands of acres covered with flowers—red and variegated and white. I think the white ones are mostly wild narcissi. The smell of the sea wind blowing over them is warranted to cure the sickest body or soul in South Africa. I wish I were there now," he added wistfully, and the pupils of his eyes expanded in an odd way.
"But you are not sick," said Poppy, smiling less wanly.
"No, but when all the flowers are in full bloom the quail come down," was the artless rejoinder. "Not that that will be for a long time yet; September is the time. But I like that place."
And Poppy liked him. It was really impossible to help it. She remembered now that she had experienced the same pleasure in his frank, kind glances and direct remarks the first time she had met him. Certainly there were dangers about him. Undoubtedly he could be a villain too, if one allowed him to be, she thought; but there is something attractive about a man who can forget he is talking to a woman and remember acres of flowers instead—and get that boyish look into his eyes at the same time! She was not the first woman, however, who had felt the charm of Charles Bramham. When he had finished with Upper Natal, he fell to telling her of a woman, a great friend of his, who had once lived in Durban, until the women drove her out saying that she was mad and bad.
"Certainly her face was all marked up," said Bramham gravely. "She said her temperament did it; but they said it was wickedness. So she went away and wrote a book about them. She let some of them down on a soft cushion, but others she hung up by their heels and they're hanging there yet—food for the aasvogels."