Dissociating herself from a convulsed silk coverlet, Gloria straightened up. “Sir Montrose Veyze,” she repeated thoughtfully and relishingly. “Why that particular and titled gentleman?”

“I got to the V’s before I found any one that seemed to fill the bill.”

“What special qualification commended him to your favorable consideration, Miss Cole?”

“Well, he’s unmarried.”

“That’s important.”

“And he’s far away. I came across that in an English magazine.”

“How far?”

“Way out in the East somewhere where one of the fifty-seven varieties of left-over wars is still going on.”

“So far, so good. What are you going to do with him when he comes back?”

“If I only knew!” was the miserable rejoinder. “Maybe he won’t come back. Maybe something will happen to him.”