"Did Mr. Dixon give you no inkling of what he wanted to see me about?" he asked, in his low, languid voice.
"None whatever," replied Charlotte, drawing the stocking she was darning from her left hand, and stretching it this way and that, to assure herself that the work was well done. They were her own stockings she was mending, and Heaven knows how many times they had gone through the process.
Some note in her voice struck Mr. Fox-Cordery as new and strange, and he regarded her more attentively.
"The old affair, I suppose," he said maliciously.
"If you mean that Mr. Dixon has any intention of reopening the subject with you," said Charlotte, laying aside the sorely-darned stocking and taking up its fellow, "you are mistaken."
Perhaps the act of stooping had brought the blood to her face, for there was a flush upon it when she lifted her head.
The flush in her face had died away, and she was now gravely attending to her work.
Mr. Fox-Cordery pulled down the ends of his little silky mustache. "Be careful how you address me, Charlotte. It is a long time since you and Mr. Dixon met."
"No; we have seen each other several times this past year."
"You made no mention to me of these meetings."
"That is an unnecessary question. Had I informed her you would not have remained in ignorance. Mother keeps nothing from you."
"You have grown into a particularly intelligent young woman," he said, and added spitefully, "Well, not exactly a young woman----" pausing to note the effect of the shot.
"I am twenty-eight," said Charlotte, in her usual tone, "and you, Fox, will be forty soon."
Her shot told better than his. "We will not continue the conversation," he said shortly.
He stepped to the fireplace, gave the bottle of flies a violent shake, looked at Charlotte as if he would have liked to serve her the same, and then resumed his place by the window, and drummed upon a pane.
"Mr. Dixon's visit here was a presumption. How dare he intrude himself into this house?"
"Settle it when he calls again," said Charlotte. "He came to see you upon some business or other."
"Which you insist upon concealing from me."
"Indeed I do not. I cannot tell you what I do not know."
"I will consider whether he shall be admitted. Don't move, Charlotte."