Flora with the toy in her hand looked round at her companion; then seeing his attention had been solicited in another quarter she moved away with the shop-girl, who had evidently offered to conduct her into the presence of more objects of the same sort.  When she reached the indicated spot I was in a position still to observe her.  She had asked some question about the working of the toy, and the girl, taking it herself, began to explain the little secret.  Flora bent her head over it, but she clearly didn’t understand.  I saw her, in a manner that quickened my curiosity, give a glance back at the place from which she had come.  Lord Iffield was talking with another young person; she satisfied herself of this by the aid of a question addressed to her own attendant.  She then drew closer to the table near which she stood and, turning her back to me, bent her head lower over the collection of toys and more particularly over the small object the girl had attempted to explain.  She took it again and, after a moment, with her face well averted, made an odd motion of her arms and a significant little duck of her head.  These slight signs, singular as it may appear, produced in my bosom an agitation so great that I failed to notice Lord Iffield’s whereabouts.  He had rejoined her; he was close upon her before I knew it or before she knew it herself.  I felt at that instant the strangest of all promptings:  if it could have operated more rapidly it would have caused me to dash between them in some such manner as to give Flora a caution.  In fact as it was I think I could have done this in time had I not been checked by a curiosity stronger still than my impulse.  There were three seconds during which I saw the young man and yet let him come on.  Didn’t I make the quick calculation that if he didn’t catch what Flora was doing I too might perhaps not catch it?  She at any rate herself took the alarm.  On perceiving her companion’s nearness she made, still averted, another duck of her head and a shuffle of her hands so precipitate that a little tin steamboat she had been holding escaped from them and rattled down to the floor with a sharpness that I hear at this hour.  Lord Iffield had already seized her arm; with a violent jerk he brought her round toward him.  Then it was that there met my eyes a quite distressing sight:  this exquisite creature, blushing, glaring, exposed, with a pair of big black-rimmed eye-glasses, defacing her by their position, crookedly astride of her beautiful nose.  She made a grab at them with her free hand while I turned confusedly away.

CHAPTER VII

I don’t remember how soon it was I spoke to Geoffrey Dawling; his sittings were irregular, but it was certainly the very next time he gave me one.