Arnaud Hallet returned promptly: “Linda, you're a little beast.” To counteract his rude speech he kissed her again. “This,” he said with less security, “threatens to become a habit. I thought, at forty-five, that I was safely by the island of sirens, but I'll be on the rocks before I know it.”
She laughed with the cool remoteness of running water.
“I wonder you haven't been murdered,” he proceeded, “in a moonless garden by an elderly lawyer. Do you ever think of the lyric day when, preceded by a flock of bridesmaids and other flowery pagan truck, you'll meet justice?”
“Marriage?” she asked. “But of course. I have everything perfectly planned—”
“Then, my dear Linda, describe him.”
“Very straight,” she said, “with beautiful polished shoes and brushed hair.”
“You ought to have no trouble finding that. Any number of my friends have one—to open the door and take your things. I might arrange a very satisfactory introduction for everybody concerned—a steady man well on his way to preside over the pantry and table.”
“You're not as funny as usual,” Linda decided critically. “That, too, disturbs me,” he replied. “It looks even more unpromising for the near future.”