"Do you admire Miss Schley's appearance?"
Robin Pierce spoke again with a touch of humorous malice. He knew Lady
Holme so well that he had no objection to seem wanting in tact to her
when he had a secret end to gain. She looked at him sharply; leaning
forward over the table and opening her eyes very wide.
"Why are you forgetting your manners to-night and bombarding me with
questions?"
"The usual reason--devouring curiosity."
She hesitated, looking at him. Then suddenly her face changed. Something,
some imp of adorable frankness, peeped out of it at him, and her whole
body seemed confiding.
"Miss Schley is going about London imitating me. Now, isn't that true?
Isn't she?"
"I believe she is. Damned impertinence!"
He muttered the last words under his breath.
"How can I admire her?"
There was something in the way she said that which touched him. He leaned
forward to her.
"Why not punish her for it?"
"How?"
"Reveal what she can't imitate."
"What's that?"
"All you hide and I divine."
"Go on."
"She mimics the husk. She couldn't mimic the kernel."
"Ice, my lady?"
Lady Holme started. Till the footman spoke she had not quite realised how
deeply interested she was in the conversation. She helped herself to some
ice.
"You can go on, Mr. Pierce," she said when the man had gone.
"But you understand."
She shook her head, smiling. Her body still looked soft and attractive,
and deliciously feminine.
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