"Why should there be anything wrong?"
"Something is," replied Kitty decidedly. "Did I swish you away from the flat against your will?"
"I should be a very ungrateful person if I failed to appreciate my present privileges."
She shook her head disgustedly.
"You're a very annoying person!" she returned. "You invariably take refuge in a compliment."
"Dear Madame Kitty"—Mallory leaned forward and looked down at her with his steady grey-blue eyes—"dear Madame Kitty, I say to you what I mean. I do not compliment my friends"—his voice deepened—"my dear, trusted friends."
His foreign twist of phrase was unusually pronounced, as always in moments of strong feeling.
"But that's just it!" she declared emphatically. "You're not trusting me—you're keeping me outside the door."
"Believe me, there's nothing you'd wish to see—the other side."
"Which means that in any case it's no use knocking at a door that won't be opened," said Kitty, apparently yielding the point. "So we'll switch off that subject and get on to the next. We go down to Mallow Court at the end of this week. I can't stand town in July. What date are you coming to us?"