"Perhaps if we chose some other subject of conversation—" John said stiffly.
"Oh, dear me!" she interrupted. "Very well! You really are a most trying person, you know. I put up with a great deal from you."
John was silent. Her face darkened a little, and an angry light flashed in her eyes.
"Well, I'll leave you alone, if you like," she decided, tossing her cigarette into the grate. "If my friendship isn't worth having, let it go. It hasn't often been offered in vain. There are more men in London than I could count who would go down on their knees for such a visit as I am paying you. And you—you," she added, with a little tremble of real anger in her tone, "you're too hatefully polite and priggish! Come and ring the bell for the lift. I am going!"
She slid gracefully to her feet, shook the cigarette ash from her clothes, and picked up her muff.
"You really are an egregious, thick-headed, obstinate countryman," she declared, as she moved toward the door. "You haven't either manners or sensibility. I am a perfect idiot to waste my time upon you. I wouldn't have done it," she added, as he followed her dumbly down the corridor, "if I hadn't rather liked you!"
"I am very sorry," he declared. "I don't know quite what I have done. I do appreciate your friendship. You have been very kind to me indeed."
She hesitated as his finger touched the bell of the lift, and glanced at the watch on her wrist.
"Well," she said, "if you want to be friends, I will give you one last chance. I am doing what sounds rather a ghastly thing—I am having a little week-end party down at my cottage at Bourne End. It will be rather like camping out, but some interesting people are coming. Will you motor down on Saturday evening and stay till Sunday night or Monday?"
"I shall be very pleased indeed," John replied. "It is very good of you to ask me. When I come, I'd like, if I may," he went on, "to tell you about myself, and why I am here, and about Louise."