"Oh, please don't compliment," she interrupted, "or you will spoil my idea of you. I imagine you a man who thinks to the point, and speaks so, too. Yes, people do watch me wherever I go; they give me flattery, and think I love it. But if you and I are to be friends——"

"Friends!" he exclaimed involuntarily.

"Are you not willing?"

"Willing!" he repeated. "Miss Blanchard, you offer what I had not dared to hope one person here would think of in connection with me. I——" He looked at her searchingly. "You are not teasing me?"

"I used a strong word," she said.

"Then you did not mean it?"

[Pg 17]

[Pg 17]

"Why," she endeavoured to explain, "I spoke hastily. I have few friends."

"Few friends? You?"

"Yes, I," she answered. "Among the men, I mean. Those of my age are so"—and she smiled—"so young! I am not posing, Mr. Ellis."

Nor was she. Her interest in the great world was genuine, even if ill-balanced. Ruled by it, she looked into men and discovered, not how much there was in them, but how little they had for her. The good, the amiable, the well-intentioned, had none of them enough backbone to suit her; it was power that she wished to find. Always among respectable people, she was often impatient at their mediocrity; always among young people, she was tired by their immaturity. This day she had for the first time questioned if older people of another class had not more for her; she had been repeating the question at the moment when Ellis was presented. And now, without pose, she scrutinised him with frank question: Was he one who could bring an interest into her life and let her see the workings of the world?

And he knew she was not posing. "It is sometimes troublesome to be friends with people," he said. "To be bound to them, to have considerations of them prevent free action—that is what friends mean in business."

"And you have few, as well?"

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