"Very little effort; it is second nature to me now."

"Even if the subject is as uninteresting as this?"

"That is all the better; one can let one's mechanical brain tackle it, and one's real thoughts can wander."

"Where to?"

She put in a fresh sheet of paper--and now glanced at him again for one second.

"Into dreamland."

"Yes, that is a ridiculously pleasant place devoid of draughts and of chilling surprises. It would be very impertinent, I suppose, if I asked you where is your dreamland?"

"Perhaps not impertinent--out of place. You are dictating a letter to the Lord Mayor of London at the moment."

"To be sure I am--you made me forget it--he is an infernal bore, the Lord Mayor of London, compelling me to branch off from this very interesting conversation to his confounded letter!--I beg your pardon!"

Katherine read aloud the last coherent sentence he had given her, and she permitted one of her faint sphinxlike smiles to play about her mouth, while her eyes sought the typing.

Gerard Strobridge moved a little nearer--he felt a sudden strong thrill.

"I shall not give you another word to type until you tell me about your dreamland--Is it in sea or sky or air?"

"It is half-past three o'clock and you are only to stay until five--had you not better attend to your work first, sir?"

She was waiting in an att.i.tude of respectful attention, infinitely provoking.

"Certainly not! I shall ask my aunt to lend you to me for another day if we do not finish this afternoon--Indeed, on second thoughts, I do not think I shall try to finish to-day--we can complete the matter at Blissington--" And then he stopped abruptly--Lao Delemar would be there!

He had melted her into a mood from which everything could be hoped during this week of uneventful family party--Beatrice would only stay for Christmas Day, and was indeed no great obstacle in any case. But he feared he would probably not be able to have interesting business interviews during the holidays with his aunt's typist.

He laughed shortly to himself, and dictated a long sentence, concluding the letter to the Lord Mayor. He had better control the interest he was feeling, that was evident!

Katherine made no remark, while she wondered what had stopped his questioning so suddenly. She smiled again a little. It had the desired effect--Mr. Strobridge jumped up from his chair and went to the fireplace.

"Well--what are you thinking about?" he demanded, from there.

"My work, of course! What else should I be thinking about?" Her eyes at last met his in innocent surprise.

"I don't believe you are quite truthful--one does not smile in that enigmatic fashion over work--dull, tedious work like this, statistics of bodies who are to benefit by this absurd charity--Oh! no, fair scribe! I feel there lies a world of malice in that smile."

"Even a scribe is permitted sometimes to make reflections."

"Not without confessing what they are."

"We are not in the days of the Spanish Inquisition--" taking up a paper.

"On the first list there is a letter for the Mayor of Manchester."

"Confound the Mayor of Manchester!"

"Poor gentleman!"

"I must know all about dreamland and cryptic reflections first."

He drew the armchair now over towards her and flung himself into it. He was a graceful creature, not so tall or so ideally perfect of form as Lord Algy, but a very presentable Englishman, with a wonderful distinction of manner and voice.

Katherine Bush was experiencing intense pleasure--there was something feline, if not altogether feminine, in her well-balanced brain. It was peculiarly gratifying to find that her plans were being justified. How glad she was that he had not remarked her in her raw days! How wise she had been to have made ready--and then waited! The whole thing was the more effective because of the complete absence of all dramatic emotion in her. She was like a quiet, capable foreign minister playing his game of statecraft with the representative of another country, his face permitted to express--or conceal--only what he desired.

At this moment, she shrugged her shoulders very slightly, as though to say, "I am only an employe. I cannot force you to work if you will not"; but she did not speak, so he was obliged to demand again.

"Won't you tell me what made you smile?--We can drift to dreamland afterwards."

"No--I will not tell you what made me smile, because I do not know exactly; the aspect of life generally, perhaps."

"And you sit and work in this gloomy back room all day--What do you know about life?"

"I am observing--I know that one must pretend interest in what one is bored by--and one must show attention to those one despises--and--keep from laughing at things."

"What a dangerous young woman, watching and coming to cynical conclusions--but you say truly; one must keep from laughing at things--a very difficult matter generally." He lay back against the brown leather cushion, and proved the truth of this by laughing softly, while he looked at her quaintly.

Katherine Bush suddenly felt that a human being understood _with her_; it was a delightful sensation.

"Practically the whole of life is a ridiculous sham and must arouse the sardonic mirth of the G.o.ds--Here are you and I spending an afternoon arranging a charity in which neither of us takes the least interest--I am dictating fulsome letters to Lord Mayors to induce them to influence others to open their purses--I don't care a jot whether they do or they do not--You are mechanically transcribing my asinine words, and we could be so much better employed exchanging views--on each other's taste, say--or each other's dreamlands."

Katherine Bush looked down and allowed her hands to fall idly in her lap--he should do most of the speaking.

"The only good that I have been getting out of it as far as I can see,"

he went on, "is the contemplation of your really beautiful hands at work--Where did you get such perfect things in these days?"

She lifted one and regarded it critically.

"Yes, I have often wondered myself. My father was an auctioneer, you know, and my mother's father was a butcher."

Gerard Strobridge was extremely entertained. She was certainly a very wonderful product of such parentage.

"May I look at them closely?" he asked.

She showed not the least embarra.s.sment; if he had been asking to see a piece of enamel, or a china vase she could not have been more detached about it. She held them out quite naturally, and he rose and took them in his own. Their touch was cool and firm, and every inch of his being tingled with pleasure. He examined them minutely finger by finger, stroking the rosy filbert nails in admiration, while an insane desire to clasp and kiss their owner grew in him.

Katherine Bush was perfectly aware of this, and when she thought he had felt emotion enough for the occasion, she drew them back as naturally as she had given them.

"I am always asking myself questions about such things," she remarked, in a tone of speculative matter-of-factness. "I am so often seeing contradictions since I have been here--My former conclusions are a little upset."

"What were they?" He had returned to his chair. He was no novice to be carried away by his sensations, and he knew very well that to indulge them further at present would be very unwise, and perhaps check a most promising amus.e.m.e.nt.

"I believed that birth and breeding gave fine ears and fine ankles and fine hands--as well as moral qualities."

"And you have been disappointed?"