As usual, she stopped at the hall table to look at the letters there. She picked one up hastily, and put it into her hand bag. Then, as she was about to ascend the stairs, she caught sight of Mr. Robertson standing in the doorway of the sitting room.
“Good evening!” said he.
Even in the dusk, she could see the gleam of his white teeth as he smiled. She knew how he looked when he smiled, anyhow, for hadn’t she been seeing him twice a day for at least six months? Olive had remarked that he “looked like a darling.” Though Miss Torrance didn’t agree with any such extravagant statement, she had secretly thought him a rather distinguished man—until she had learned that he was a friend of Mr. Martin’s.
He was tall, very slender, very dark, with keen, thin features and an odd smile that lifted his neat black mustache up to his narrow nostrils, giving him an expres[Pg 188]sion a little fierce, but altogether agreeable. Of course, she didn’t know him, and wouldn’t know him. Let him smile! He was a friend of that Mr. Martin’s, and he and Mr. Martin were both in a conspiracy to rob her of Olive.
Still, she couldn’t very well refuse to answer, and so she did, after a fashion. Mr. Robertson did not seem to be discouraged. He made another remark, which she also felt obliged to answer. Indeed, he began to talk, and so artful was he that before she realized what she was doing, Miss Torrance was engaged in conversation with him.
She was thus engaged when Olive came, but that brought her to herself. With the coldest little nod for Mr. Robertson, she went upstairs.
“I see you were talking to Mr. Robertson,” Olive observed.
“I couldn’t help it,” said Miss Torrance, with a frown. “He’s—well, I don’t like the man.”
Strange, then, that as she lay awake that night Miss Torrance should constantly see before her the image of Mr. Robertson—a tall, dark form in the dark hall, lounging against the hat stand in one of his characteristically easy and nonchalant attitudes! Strange that she should keep seeing his gleaming smile, and hearing in her ears his quiet, courteous voice!
All this caused her a curious uneasiness. For some reason it seemed to her a great misfortune, almost a disaster, that he had spoken to her. A very great misfortune! There he was, however, whether she liked him or not.