"It's not so very old," he said reflectively.

"It'll be horrid to be twenty-one," she answered, with a pout. "I shall have to pay my own bills—and I'm frightfully in debt. It's such fun, too, to be quite irresponsible. Of course you were born old, David; if I lived to be a hundred I should never catch you up."

"Twenty," he repeated. "No, it's not so very old. In five years' time——"

"My dear, I shall be a quarter of a century old!" she exclaimed.

"You'll be tired of it all by then."

"I shall be dead or married," she answered gloomily.

"Not married. I shall come to you then—you'll have outgrown your present phase and I shall be a rich man. I shall come to you...." He broke off and sat looking up into her eyes.

Sonia drew back her hand and returned his gaze steadily. A smile of mockery flickered for a moment round her lips.

"And then?" she demanded.

"I shall ask you to marry me."