"Please read The Lyric Hour, Doctor," I urged, in my prettiest party voice. "You will find it really worth while."
The creature is, after all, occasionally understanding. He smiled forgivingly at me and held out his hand for the book. But I hadn't meant that.
"Oh!" I said, hastily. "Not my copy!"
"As precious as all that?" he asked, putting his rejected hand in his pocket.
This I ignored.
"Tell Mr. John Denton to send you out a copy," I suggested. "He sent us this one."
"The devil he did!"
I looked my surprise, and my visitor laughed. He has a very nice laugh, considering.
"I beg your pardon, Miss Carroll. I am apt to be a trifle—," he paused, and considered me narrowly, "eh—jumpy. And I didn't know my Uncle John went in for ethereal chaps."
Ethereal! The word, on those lips, was an insult! I glared at him, rather conscious that I must look like a sick kitten.