“You are very kind to think of it,” she said, “but—don’t you think perhaps—that I had better not?”
He smiled indulgently.
“My dear child,” he said, “with me you need have no apprehension. I am almost old enough to be your father.”
She looked at him with uplifted eyebrows—a look of whimsical incredulity. Sir John felt that after all forty-five was not so very old.
“That sounds quite absurd,” she answered. “Yet it is my last evening, and I think—if you are sure that you would like to have me—that I will risk it.”
“We will go to a very quiet place,” he assured her, “a place where I have often taken my own sisters. You will be wearing your travelling dress, and no doubt you would prefer it. Shall we say at half-past seven?”
She rose from her chair.
“I will take a carriage,” she said, “and fetch my things.”
“Let us say that Café Maston, in the Boulevard des Italiennes, at half-past seven then,” he decided. “I shall be waiting for you there, and in the meantime, if you will help yourself—pray don’t look like that. It is a very small affair, after all, and you can pay me back if you will.”
She took the pocket-book and looked up at him with a little impulsive movement. Her voice shook, her eyes were very soft and melting.