You, I say, are also at
loose ends. Can you deny it? My dear sir, don't we both know that ever
since we left London you have been ready to fall in love with any
pretty thing in petticoats that seemed to promise you three ha'porth of
kindness. A lost dog looking for a master! You're a stray man looking
for a mistress. Miss Grammont being a woman is a little more selective
than that. But if she's at a loose end as I suppose, she isn't protected
by the sense of having made her selection. And she has no preconceptions
of what she wants. You are a very interesting man in many ways. You
carry marriage and entanglements lightly. With an air of being neither
married nor entangled. She is quite prepared to fall in love with you."
"But you don't really think that?" said Sir Richmond, with an
ill-concealed eagerness.
Dr. Martineau rolled his face towards Sir Richmond. "These
miracles--grotesquely--happen," he said. "She knows nothing of Martin
Leeds.... You must remember that....
"And then," he added, "if she and you fall in love, as the phrase goes,
what is to follow?"
There was a pause.
Sir Richmond looked at his toes for a moment or so as if he took counsel
with them and then decided to take offence.
"Really!" he said, "this is preposterous.
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