“And how about a landsman?” she asked, archly.
“I would ask mercy for a landsman, but would advise him not to listen to your voice too often.”
“Then—you do not wish to be charmed?”
“As I am already, it is too late for me to express such a wish.”
“Then I shall sing you another song for making such a pretty speech.”
So she sang again, but the two in the next room remained where they were; the boy happy and entranced, the woman calculating and cold. Then Kathleen Weir tired of singing, and turned around on her music-stool and talked to Webster.
“Bring a chair,” she said to him, “and let us have a chat—or no, I will sit on the rug; I am like a cat, and love the warmth.”
She was like a cat, also, in the extraordinary suppleness of her limbs. She curled herself up now on the soft, white rug before the fire, and leaned back on a couch near, and fanned herself with a great feather fan.
“Now tell me something of your life,” she said, looking up at Webster, who had drawn a chair toward the fire also.
“What part of it?” he asked, looking down smilingly at the graceful woman before him.