“You’re too nice for an office,” she said, looking at me so sweetly and sadly.  “You ought to be a gentleman!”

“Oh, dear!” I exclaimed, “I hope I am that, even if I do grub along in an office.”  I wish my partners could have heard me say that.  Why, I have a private elevator of my own and a squash-court on the roof!

“Of course, I don’t mean that,” she went on quickly, “but like us, I mean, with a castle and a place in society——­”

“I have a sort of little picayune place in New York,” I interrupted.  “I don’t sleep in the office, you know.  At night I go out and see my friends and sometimes they invite me to dinner.”

She looked at me more sadly than ever.  I don’t believe humour was Verna’s strong suit anyway,—­not American humour, at least,—­for she not only believed what I said, but more too.

“I must speak to Papa about you,” she said.

“What will he do?” I asked.

“Oh, help you along, you know,” she said; “ffrenches always stand together; it’s a family trait, though it’s dying out now for lack of ffrenches.  You know our family motto?” she went on.

“I’m afraid I don’t,” I said.

“‘Ffrenches first!’” she returned.

I had to laugh.

“We’ve lived up to it in America,” I said.

“Papa is quite a power in the City,” she said.

“I thought he was a gentleman,” I replied.

“Everybody dabbles in business nowadays,” she returned, not perceiving the innuendo.  “I am sure Papa ought to know all about it from the amount of money he has lost.”

“Perhaps his was a case of ffrenches last!” I said.

“Still, he knows all the influential people,” she continued, “and it would be so easy for him to get you a position over here.”

“That would be charming,” I said.

“And then I might see you occasionally,” she said, with such a little ring of kindness in her voice that for a minute I felt a perfect brute for deceiving her.  “You could run down here from Saturday to Monday, you know, and on Bank Holidays, and in the season you would have the entree to our London house and the chance of meeting nice people!”

“How jolly!” I said.

“I can’t bear you to go back to America,” she said.  “Now that I’ve found you, I’m going to keep you.”

“I hate the thought of going back myself,” I said, and so I did—­ at the thought of leaving that angel!

“Then, you know,” she went on, somewhat shyly and hesitatingly, “you have such good manners and such a good air, and you’re so——­ "

“Don’t mind saying handsome,” I remarked.

“You really are very nice-looking,” she said, with a seriousness that made me acutely uncomfortable, “and what with our friendship and our house open to you and the people you could invite down here, because I know Papa is going to go out of his mind about you—­he and I are always crazy about the same people, you know—­ not to speak of the little f, there is no reason, Fyles, why in the end you shouldn’t marry an awfully rich girl and set up for yourself!”