I have a proposal to make.

You'll agree to it or not, as you choose.

But if you don't agree, forget it, with everything I may have said." "My services and my memory are both at your disposal," answered Ivor, in such a gay, happy voice that something told me he had already talked with Diana--and that in spite of me she had not snubbed him.

"I am honoured--I won't say flattered, for I'm too much in earnest--that you should place any confidence in me." I lay there behind the lounge and sneered at this speech of his.

Of course, I said to myself, he would be ready to do anything to please the Foreign Secretary, since all the big plums his ambition craved were in the gift of that man.
"Frankly, I'm in a difficulty, and it has occurred to me that you can help me out of it better than anyone else I know," said the smooth, trained voice.