was there, the next evening, and welcomed her as an old friend; in fact, he talked so much that she grew uneasy.
“We’d better work a little,” she said. “Wouldn’t it be awful if a teacher should come and scold us—at our age!”
“What I particularly want to ask,” he said, “is, if you’d come down to Brighton Beach to-morrow? I’ll run you down in Horace’s motor. We’ll have lunch and a swim and get back early. Will that be all right?”
“I’d love it,” she answered, “but I don’t know whether Miss E. could spare me. I’ll ask her.”
“Perhaps if I came home with you this evening, it would look better. So that she can see what sort of chap I am. I could stop in for a moment, couldn’t I?”
“Yes,” Frances answered, doubtfully, “but—I suppose so ... but I’ll have to explain a little in advance. There’s a young German who comes every evening to see her, and you’re sure to find him there.”
“Every evening, eh?”
“Yes; he’s her cousin.”
He frowned over this; asked a number of questions.
“Are you sure she’s all right?” he demanded. “You can’t be too careful, you know.”
“Oh, yes!” Frances asserted, positively, although she was far from sure that he would think so.
“I’ll certainly stop in this evening,” he said. “I want to see for myself.”
“I don’t think you’d better,” she said, reluctantly, “Miss E.’s awfully queer, eccentric, you know. She mightn’t like it.”
“But I want to see her,” he insisted. “She surely can’t object to my stopping in for half a minute. You’re not a servant.”
“It’s not that”
“I want to see for myself,” he repeated. “It may not be a suitable place for you at all. I’d know at once.”
His attitude, his air of protection, delighted Frankie while it annoyed her. She was so firmly convinced that she could take care of herself, so jealous of her freedom, that she didn’t want even advice. And still couldn’t help being very much pleased by this wholly masculine gesture.
In the end she agreed. And was at once sorry and wretched, going through her classes in a nightmare of worry. How would Miss Eppendorfer take it? What would she think of Frankie’s walking in, uninvited, unpermitted, with a strange man? And how to explain him? Now she was ready to confess herself imprudent. She would have given anything she owned if something would have prevented Mr. Naylor from coming.
He, of course, was perfectly unruffled, as anyone conscious of such superiority would be. He followed Frances into the little Mission sitting-room where Miss Eppendorfer and Mr. Hassler were smoking side by side on the sofa. Frances was bitterly embarrassed; for a minute she couldn’t speak at all. She saw them both staring at her in amazement.
“I’ve brought my friend, Mr. Naylor, in for a few minutes,” she said, in a strained, artificial sort of voice. “We”
Nothing more came; the girl who could always take care of herself couldn’t account for her visitor.
“We met at the business school,” said Naylor, “and as we were more or less the only human beings there, we naturally had to be friends.”
At the sound of his careless voice, Miss Eppendorfer’s look of amazement died away. She got up and shook hands with him, presented him to Kurt, and asked him to sit down. She was like a good servant; she knew class when she saw it.
Never before had Frances realised how distinguished her Mr. Naylor was until she saw him in Miss Eppendorfer’s sitting-room. She saw the authoress inspecting him in her detailed and unabashed way, staring at him, computing the cost of his clothes, comprehending the high degree he possessed of what she called “style,” and so greatly admired. She was deeply impressed.
He was very gallant to the poor thing, which delighted her beyond measure. No denying that she made a fool of herself. She was coy, imperious, more youthful than she had ever dared to be with Kurt, and, no matter how preposterous her behaviour, Mr. Naylor didn’t once attempt to catch Frankie’s eye, never encouraged her to be more preposterous.
Poor Miss Eppendorfer! Frankie, watching her, reflected on her ingratiating servility toward Mr. Hassler and her present conduct with Mr. Naylor, and found it impossible to reconcile all this with the Miss Eppendorfer she knew. Could it be the same woman who often talked to her with sense, with cynical shrewdness, with sharp knowledge of the world? The same woman who wrote books and sold them, knew how to make money and how to invest it? At the sound of a man’s voice she was horribly bewitched, even her face lost its look of worn good nature and took on a false and stupid simper. It hurt Frances, she was genuinely grateful to Mr. Naylor for not sneering.