And now I suppose I must let you go and dress for dinner. How
is our estimable friend, Miss Clinker? She is with you, I suppose?--or
have you friends staying in the hotel? You did not tell me in your
letters."
"I never waste sweetness upon the desert air," she said, smiling, with a
glitter in her eyes. "You did not appear over anxious to hear of my
doings. Our correspondence made me laugh sometimes. You never wrote as
though you had received any of my letters--yours were just masterpieces
of how little to say--and of how to say it beautifully!"
John Derringham shrugged his shoulders slightly; he did not defend
himself, and her anger rose. So that she was leaving the room with her
head in the air and two bright spots of pink in her cheeks.
Then he felt constrained to vindicate his position, so he put his arm
round her and drew her to him, intending to kiss her. But she looked up
into his face with an expression in her eyes which left him completely
repulsed. It was mocking and bitter and cunning, and she put out her
hand and pushed him from her.
"I do not want any of your caresses to-night," she said.
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