Then it might have been seen that she had a purpose, for as soon as the elements had again, with a due amount of the usual shuffling and mismatching, been mixed, her case proved the first to have been settled.

She had got Mr.Longdon beside her on a sofa that was just right for two.

"I've seized you without a scruple," she frankly said, "for there are things I want to say to you as well as very particularly to ask.

More than anything else of course I want again to thank you." No collapse of Mr.Longdon's was ever incompatible with his sitting well forward.

"'Again' ?" "Do you look so blank," she demanded, "because you've really forgotten the gratitude I expressed to you when you were so good as to bring Nanda up for Aggie's marriage ?--or because you don't think it a matter I should trouble myself to return to?
How can I help it," she went on without waiting for his answer, "if I see your hand in everything that has happened since the so interesting talk I had with you last summer at Mertle?
There have been times when I've really thought of writing to you; I've even had a bold bad idea of proposing myself to you for a Sunday.