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96 "Look here, you'd better have a smoke and calm down, young man," he said. "It's no use going to see Bentham in a state like this."

The young man threw himself into a chair. Suddenly he sat up again, and addressed the Baroness.

"I say," he exclaimed, "how is it that you have a key to this flat? What did you come here for this afternoon?"

The Baroness laughed softly.

"Well, I got the key from the landlord a few days ago. I told him that I might take the flat, and he told me to come in and look at it and return the key—which you see I haven't done. To be quite honest with you, though, I had another reason for coming here."

The young man looked at her with mingled suspicion and admiration. She had raised her veil now, and even Wrayson was aware that he had scarcely realized how beautiful a woman she was. Her tailor-made gown of dark green cloth fitted her to perfection; she was turned out with all that delightful perfection of detail which seems to be the Frenchwoman's heritage. Her smile, half pathetic, half appealing, was certainly sufficient to turn the head of a dozen young men such as Sydney Barnes.

"I have told you," she continued, "that your brother and I used to be very good friends. I wrote him now and then some rather foolish letters. He promised to destroy them, but—men are so foolish, you know, sometimes—I was never quite sure that he had kept his word, and I meant to take this opportunity of looking for myself that he had not left them about. You do not blame me, Mr. Sydney? You are not cross?"