“Will you?”
“I never smoke in the morning.”
“No more do I. Don’t let my nerves get ahead of me.”
“It would be delightful to see you all again,” said Julia, amiably, as he took off his overcoat and made himself comfortable. Then she plunged into the safe subject of Mrs. Bode and her amusing experiences in London during the Spanish war, meanwhile examining him with cool smiling eyes, which appeared to dwell upon the cheerful memory of his sister. She was gratified to find him as well dressed and groomed, even to the crown of his sleek black head, as any man he might meet in Piccadilly, and confessed that she would have been intensely disappointed had his attire been as Western as his vocabulary. His accent was also agreeable, without nasal inflection, and although it lacked the cultivation of the best English voice, it was manly even over the telephone. He had grown several inches taller, although he had been a tall boy, and his figure was straight and well set up. Save for the keen depth of the black-gray eyes, and the accentuated squareness of chin and jaw, he had changed surprisingly little. Even as a boy he had held his head high; now he had the air of one accustomed to command a large number of men. His manner, while courteous and amiable, betrayed possibilities of impatience. She could quite appreciate what he had once written her, that he was “some pumpkins on the street.”
He looked steadily at her as they talked, and she detected an expression both defensive and wary at the back of his eyes, reflected in the slight smile on his firm, rather grim mouth. She guessed that he had no intention of falling in love with her again. Every once in a while, however, his eyes flashed with admiration, and then he looked quite boyish; his smile was spontaneous and delightful. But she suddenly realized that he would not be as easy to understand as she had thought.
“You might have sent me a photograph,” he said abruptly, tired of Cherry. “I have a large collection of libels, cut from weekly magazines, but —”
“How odd you never asked for one.”
“I guess I didn’t want the charming picture in my mind disturbed. I feared you might have grown to look masculine, at the least. It’s queer you haven’t, you know.”
“None of us looks masculine, although a good many look sexless, if you like. Don’t you want to come down to the offices and meet the big ones?”
“I—do—not.”