"Just look at Scarum's ears! Don't tease her. She doesn't like it. Dear thing! She's delicious to kiss—she's got such a soft nose. But she'll bolt as soon as look at you, and she's awfully hard to hold." Her fingers were twitching with the desire to hold Scarum.
"I think I can manage her."
"You see, somehow or the other I like talking to you. You may be a sinner, but I don't think you are a fool; and I've a sort of a notion that you understand."
He was silent. So many women had thought he understood.
"I wonder—do you understand!"
The eyes that Mrs. Nevill Tyson turned on Stanistreet were not search-lights; they were wells of darkness, unsearchable, unfathomable.
Something in Stanistreet, equally inscrutable, something that was himself and not himself, answered very low to that vague appeal.
"Yes, I understand."
He had turned towards her, smiling darkly, and all her face flashed back a happy smile.
Surely, oh surely, Mrs. Nevill Tyson was the soul of indiscretion; for at that moment Miss Batchelor, trotting past with Lady Morley, looked from them to her companion and smiled too.