"No, I drink if I want to—but not spirits."
"Oh, I know—those old Cape pontacs. Save me from them!" Miss Cornell looked piously at the ceiling. The other girl, who had never tasted Cape pontac in her life, only smiled her subtle smile.
Sophie seated herself in a lounge-chair, opposite her visitor, and crossed her legs, incidentally revealing her smart French-heeled shoes and a good deal of open-work stocking through which to lilac-coloured eyes her legs looked as though they were painted red. Piccanin meanwhile removed from the room the luncheon débris, his bare feet cheeping on the pale native matting and his long black eyes taking interested glances at the visitor whenever she was not looking his way.
"And now let's get to business," said Miss Cornell. "First of all, you haven't told me your name yet."
The lilac eyes were hidden for a moment under white lids, and a faint colour swept over the pale skin.
"Rosalind Chard."
"Well, I shall call you Rosalind, of course, and you can call me Sophie if you like. Sophie Cornell's my name. Rather pretty, isn't it?"
"Very," said Miss Chard in her gentle, entrancing voice.
"Well, now I'll tell you: I come from Cradock, in the Cape Colony, but I've been living all over the place since I left home. First, I went to stay with my sister in Kimberley. Have you ever been to Kimberley? Man! I tell you it's the most glorious place—at least, it used to be before everybody went to Jo ... you know Jo-burg, of course?"
Miss Chard shook her head.