of my visit excite comment among
your neighbours?"

"Of course you may come in."

Paul walked into the cosy little sitting-room and Flamby having closed
the door contrived to kick the newspaper under the bureau whilst placing
an armchair for Paul. Paul smiled and made a nest of cushions in a
corner of the settee. "Sit there, Flamby," he said, "and let me talk to
you."

Flamby sat down facing him, and her nerves beginning to recover from the
shock imposed upon them, she found that her heart was really beating,
and beating rapidly. Paul was in evening dress, and as the night was
showery, wore a loose Burberry. A hard-working Stetson hat, splashed
with rain, he had dropped upon the floor beside his chair. His face
looked rather gaunt in the artificial light, which cast deep shadows
below his eyes, and he was watching her in a way that led her to hope,
yet fear, that he might have come to speak about the Charleswood
photographs. He was endowed with that natural distinction whose
possessor can never be ill at ease, yet he was palpably bent upon some
project which he scarcely knew how to approach.

"Will you have a cigarette?" asked Flamby, in a faint voice. "You may
smoke your pipe if you would rather."

"May I really?" said Paul buoyantly. "It is a very foul pipe, and will
perfume your curtains frightfully."

"I like it. Lots of my visitors smoke pipes."

"You have a number of visitors, Flamby?"

"Heaps. I never had so many friends in my life."

Paul began to charge his briar from a tattered pouch. "Have you ever
thought, Flamby, that I neglected you?" he asked slowly.

"Neglected me? Of course not. You have been to see me twice, and I felt
all the time that I was keeping you from your work. Besides--why should
I expect you to bother about me?"

"You have every reason to expect it, Flamby. Your father was--a tenant
of my uncle, and as I am my uncle's heir, his debts are mine. Your
father saved me from the greatest loss in the world. Lastly"--he lighted
his pipe--"I want you to count me amongst your friends."

He held the extinguished match in his fingers, looking around for an
ash-tray. Flamby jumped up, took the match and threw it in the hearth,
then returned slowly to her place. Her hands were rather unsteady, and
she tucked them away behind her, squeezing up closely against the
cushions. "We _are_ friends," she said. "You have always been my
friend."

"I don't want you to feel alone in the world, as thou