"What is the wonderful attraction about Baring?" he asked discontentedly.
"Really, there isn't any," she replied. "I like to be kind, that is all.
I do not like to hurt anybody's feelings, and I know that Captain Baring
would like very much to dine with me to-night himself. I was obliged to
throw him over last night because of Mr. Selingman's arrival."
"You have not always been so considerate," he persisted. "Why this
especial care for Baring's feelings?"
She turned her head a little towards him. She was leaning back in her
corner of the lounge, her hands clasped behind her head. There was an
elaborate carelessness about her pose which she numbered among her
best effects.
"Perhaps," she retorted, "I, too, find your sudden attraction for me a
little remarkable. On those few occasions when you did honour us at the
club before you left for Berlin, you were agreeable enough, but I do not
remember that you once asked me to dine with you. There was no Captain
Baring then."
"The truth is," Norgate confessed, "since I returned, I have felt rather
like hiding myself. I don't care about going to my own club or visiting
my own friends. I came to the St.
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