"When are you going to take me to Ritzen?" she asked instead.
"To Ritzen!" He glanced up again in surprise. "Do you want to go
to Ritzen?"
"Or Brennerstadt," she said, "Whichever is the best shopping
centre."
"Oh!" He began to smile. "You want to shop, do you? What do you
want to buy?"
She looked at him severely. "Nothing for myself, I am glad to say."
"What! Something for me?" His smile gave him that look--that
boyish look--which once she had loved so dearly upon Guy's face.
She felt as if something were pulling at her heart. She ignored it
resolutely.
"You will have to buy it for yourself," she told him sternly.
"I've got nothing to buy it with. It's something you ought to have
got long ago--if you had any sense of decency."
"What on earth is it?" Burke dropped his pipe into his pocket and
gave her his full attention.
Sylvia, with a cigarette between her lips, got up to find the
matches. She lighted it very deliberately under his watching eyes,
then held out the match to him. "Light up, and I'll tell you."
He took the slender wrist, blew out the match, and held her, facing
him.
"Sylvia," he said. "I ought to have gone into the money question
with you before. But all I have is yours. You know that, don't
you?"
She laughed at him through the smoke. "I know where you keep it
anyhow, partner," she said.
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