With that he went, and we two were left facing each other.
"This is one of Henry's inspirations, Miss Katherine," Russell said. "I--I don't usually have to wait until the family is out before I make a call."
"Families are queer," I said non-committally. There was a window open and I stood near it, under a pink lamp, and let my hair blow about.
"Are we going to sit down, or am I to be banished as soon as I've explained that I am a safe companion for a débutante?"
He was plainly laughing at me, although he was uncomfortable too. And I have some spirit left.
"I am afraid you are giving me credit for too much interest," I said. "This is Henry's idea, you know. You needn't defend yourself to me. You look--entirely safe."
He hated that. No man likes to look entirely safe. He put his hands in his pockets and half closed his eyes.
"Humph!" he said. "Then I gather that this whole meeting is a mistake. I'm respectable enough to be uninteresting, and the ban your people have placed on me doesn't particularly concern you!"
"That's not quite true," I said slowly. "I--if I ever got a chance to know you really well, I'm sure we'd be--but I'll never get a chance, you know."
"Upon my word," he broke out, "I'd like to know just what your people have heard! But that doesn't matter. What really matters"--he had hardly taken his eyes off me--"what really matters is that I am going to see you again. Often!"
"Rot! We're always going to the same places. Am I absolutely warned off?"
He began to walk up and down the room. Half an hour before he had never given me a thought. Henry, I knew, had lugged him there by sheer force and a misplaced sense of justice. And now he was pacing about in a rage!
"If it's Mrs. Warrington all the fuss is about, it's imbecile," he said. "In the first place, there never was anything to it. In the second place, it's all over anyhow."
"You know the whole thing. Don't pretend you don't. You've got the face of a little saint, with all that fluffy hair, but your eyes don't belong to the rest, young lady. Are you going to dance with me to-night?"
"Well, you'll give me a little time, won't you? I suppose we can sit in a closet and talk, or hide on a veranda."
So I promised, and, the car being announced, he put my wrap round my shoulders.