She looked curiously round. "Please pick up your pipe. It's going out. I don't mind smoke, indeed I don't. Even if I did, I should be prepared to pay the penalty of bearding an editor in his den."
Raphael resumed his pipe gratefully.
"I wonder though you don't set the place on fire," Esther rattled on, "with all this mass of inflammable matter about."
"It is very dry, most of it," he admitted, with a smile.
"Why don't you have a real fire? It must be quite cold sitting here all day. What's that great ugly picture over there?"
"That steamer! It's an advertisement."
"Heavens! What a decoration. I should like to have the criticism of that picture. I've brought you those picture-galleries, you know; that's what I've come for."
"Thank you! That's very good of you. I'll send it to the printers at once." He took the roll and placed it in a pigeon-hole, without taking his eyes off her face.
"Why don't you throw that awful staring thing away?" she asked, contemplating the steamer with a morbid fascination, "and sweep away the old papers, and have a few little water-colors hung up and put a vase of flowers on your desk. I wish I had the control of the office for a week."
"I wish you had," he said gallantly. "I can't find time to think of those things. I am sure you are brightening it up already."