Page:Guy Boothby - The Beautiful White Devil.djvu/162

 taken in by the Beautiful White Devil, we have been a little sceptical on the subject of heiresses down this way."

"On that point, I'm afraid I cannot inform yon," I said laughingly. "She seems, however, to travel in very good style, and evidently denies herself nothing. But you spoke of the Beautiful White Devil, I am most interested in what I have heard of that personage. Are you well up in the subject?"

"How should I be?" he answered, as I thought, a little quickly. "Of course I know what every other man in the East knows, but no more. Thank goodness she has never done me the honour of abducting me as she did the Sultan of Surabaya and those other Johnnies. But with regard to Miss Sanderson, I wonder if I should be considered impertinent if I asked you to give me the pleasure of an introduction."

Of course I did not tell him that it was the very thing of all others that I desired to do, but at the same time I could hardly conceal my exultation. I had, however, to keep my delight to myself for fear lest he should suspect; so I relit my cigar, which had gone out, and then said, with as much carelessness as I could assume:

"I don't know altogether whether I'm sufficiently intimate with her to take the liberty of introducing you; but, as I said just now, she seems a jolly sort of girl, and not inclined to be stand-offish, so if ever I get an opportunity I don't mind risking it. Now, I think, if you'll excuse me, I'll say good-night. That wretched old bucket of a steamer rolled so all the way up from Tanjong Priok that I have hardly had a wink of sleep these three nights past."