"Thank you—quite. Are you really going to dine with us? Are you sure you want to? Oh, I know you've given up some very gay dinner somewhere—"
"I was going to dine with Boots when Nina rescued me. Poor Boots!—I think I'll telephone—"
"Telephone him to come here!" begged Drina. "Would he come? Oh, please—I'd love to have him."
"I wish you would ask him," said Eileen; "it's been so lonely and stupid to lie in bed with a red nose and fishy eyes and pains in one's back and limbs. Please do let us have a party."
So Selwyn went to the telephone, and presently returned, saying that Boots was overwhelmed and would be present at the festivities; and Drina, enraptured, ordered flowers to be brought from the dining-room and a large table set for four, with particular pomp and circumstance.
Mr. Archibald Lansing arrived very promptly—a short, stocky young man of clean and powerful build, with dark, keen eyes always alert, and humorous lips ever on the edge of laughter under his dark moustache.
His manner with Drina was always delightful—a mixture of self-repressed idolatry and busily naïve belief in a thorough understanding between them to exclude Selwyn from their company.
"This Selwyn fellow here!" he exclaimed. "I warned him over the 'phone we'd not tolerate him, Drina. I explained to him very carefully that you and I were dining together in strictest privacy—"
"He begged so hard," said Eileen. "Will somebody place an extra pillow for Drina?"