Much confused, Mr. Standen begged pardon. “Thinking to myself!” he explained.
She paid no heed to this, but said fiercely: “ Do you mean that?”
“No, no! That is—couldn’t blame him, Kit! Handsome phiz, you know—devil of a Corinthian—never at a stand! Daresay you don’t know it, but the fact is any number of caps set at him! High-fliers, too. Queer creatures, females,” mused Mr. Standen, shaking his head. “Fellow’s only got to be a rake to have ’em all dangling after him. Silly, really, because it stands to reason—Well, never mind that!”
“Good gracious, Freddy, as though I was not well-aware that Jack is a shocking flirt!” said Kitty untruthfully, but with spirit. “I have not the least doubt that he flirts with all the prettiest ladies in London! Which makes it so particularly stupid and—and diverting of Uncle Matthew to suppose that he wished to offer for me! Indeed, I can’t imagine why anyone should think he would do so. I should be astonished to learn that he regards me as anything other than a dowdy schoolgirl!”
“Yes, I should be too,” agreed the Job’s comforter on the other side of the table.
Miss Charing swallowed another mouthful of punch. A gentle glow was spreading through her veins, dispelling the melancholy which had possessed her. It would have been too much to have said that she was restored to happiness, but she no longer despaired. A certain exhilaration infused her brain, which seemed all at once to be able quite easily to master difficulties that, a few minutes before, had appeared so insoluble. She sat bolt upright in her chair, staring straight ahead, the fingers of one hand tightening unconsciously round her tumbler. Mr. Standen, glad to be left in peace to wrestle with the second of the problems confronting him, meditatively rubbed the rim of his quizzing-glass up and down the bridge of his nose.
“Freddy!” said Miss Charing suddenly, turning her expressive eyes towards him.
He gave a slight start, and let his quizzing-glass fall. “Thinking of something else!” he excused himself.
“Freddy, you are quite sure you don’t want to marry me, aren’t you?”
He looked a little alarmed, for she spoke with a degree of urgency which made him feel uneasy. “Yes,” he said. He added apologetically: “Very fond of you, Kit, always was! Thing is, not a marrying man!”