She chose the easy-chair, and crossed her legs with a good deal of rustle and a considerable display of black silk stocking.
She looked at him curiously. "Are you still angry with me?" she asked.
"Well, I don't usually bear malice," he answered, "but I can scarcely forgive your method of dealing with Miss Rowan!"
"Or its results?" she asked, with a little laugh. "Well, I came out on the top, anyhow, and you must remember, Mr. Deane, that I was desperate,—you don't know how desperate," she continued, after a moment's pause. "I hadn't a shilling left in the world!—not a shilling!—not a friend! And somewhere in London there was wealth that belonged to me!"
"That," Deane remarked dryly, "is a matter which is as yet undecided."
"Well, I judge by facts," she answered with a little laugh. "Lawyers don't usually throw money away, do they? They're willing to advance me all I want on the security of the Little Anna Gold-Mine."
Deane smiled upon her genially. "My mine," he remarked.
"No!" she declared,—"the property of the legatees of Richard Sinclair!"
Deane shook his head. "My dear young lady," he said, "you were more in your element when you walked bareheaded upon the sands of Rakney, and saved me from a wetting, than in your present pose."
"And you," she declared, "were nicer to me, a great deal, for those few days."