"I'd love to straighten it out for you some time—fix it up. Ah—would you let me?"
"I think—Blythe would object."
"Oh, yes—your servant. Nasty thing." Off again, in another direction. "You know, Major, I can't understand why you've never married."
Though he did not move a muscle, she felt instinctively that he shrank into his shell. She did not notice that one hand, resting on the table, was trembling.
"Never met a woman who would have me," he answered evasively.
"Oh, that's nonsense. Why, any woman—any woman would be proud——"
"Thank you," he bowed a little stiffly, though with an amused twinkle. "Feeling better?"
"Much! But I think—a little more brandy."
So they went on talking, she doing the leading, he following lamely. She sipped at the brandy. The conversation became increasingly intimate. Several times she touched him caressingly with her hand. He was restless—anxious, perhaps, for her to go—quivering for the conventions. But she lingered on, now quite at home, and radiating with a physical magnetism.
She was the embodiment of the woman whose indiscriminate favours crossed men's swords in other days.