“I hope not,” she answered gravely; “I should be doubly sorry now if you didn’t come.”
“There is no fear of that,” he said. “I enjoy seeing myself reproduced. It is so often an improvement, you know, yet one invariably flatters oneself that it is as one habitually looks.”
“We haven’t done much to foster your conceit so far,” she observed.
“Oh! I don’t know,” he answered. “I really thought that that last portrait was a bit like me. Somebody told me I did look like that sometimes when I had a liver attack.”
“Evie said it was a libel,” St. John remarked tentatively.
“Ah! Well, I should be sorry to contradict her,” he replied, and Jill fancied, though she could not be quite sure, that he looked slightly displeased at the mention of Miss Bolton’s name. Why should a name that had once been his sole subject of conversation excite his annoyance now? It was not consistent. Had it been a case of unrequited affection she could have understood his being hurt, but displeasure was something she could not account for; it irritated her, why she could not have explained. She was not accustomed to analyse her sensations even to herself; it would have been wiser if she had; for her instinct was wonderfully true, and her nature peculiarly observant.
“You put me on my mettle,” she said, smiling. “It shan’t be a libel this time I promise you if infinite pains can prevent.”
“I am not afraid to trust myself in your hands,” he said.
Jill laughed.
“That’s very fulsome flattery,” she answered. “I was responsible for the libel, remember. Mr Thompkins declares that I shall ruin the firm yet. It is so humiliating because I was so positive at first that I was going to become one of those celebrated lady photographers who have all the best people sitting to them, and can charge any price they like.”