"So happy! Will you allow me to call for you—at—at your lodgings?"
"Thanks, Sir Lemuel, if you will kindly call here at your own hour, it will be more directly in your way home, and you will find me ready to accompany you."
"Quite right. I will be here at seven. Good morning."
And with this the banker went away.
"He wants me to make an article about something, I suppose," mused the young man when the elder had gone. "I will go. I will see that sweet girl again, even if I never see her afterwards."
The temptation was certainly very strong. And so, at the appointed hour, when the banker called at the office of the National Liberator he found the young gentleman in evening dress ready to accompany him home.
Salome Levison was dressed for dinner, and seated in the drawing-room with her chaperone, Lady Belgrade.
Salome was certainly not expecting any guest. But she intended to go to the opera that evening with Lady Belgrade, to hear the last act of Norma. Luckily for Sir Lemuel's plan, it was not a peremptory engagement, and could easily be set aside.
On this evening she was beautifully dressed. She wore a delicate tea-rose tinted rich silk skirt, with an over skirt of point lace, looped up with tea-rose buds, a tea-rose in her dark hair, a necklace of opals set in diamonds, and bracelets of the same beautiful jewels. Refined, elegant, and most interesting she certainly looked.
Meanwhile, the banker came home, and himself conducted the unexpected guest to the drawing-room.