Page:The Outcry (London, Methuen & Co., 1911).djvu/296

282 She played on him for an instant all her radiance. "Yes then, you dear sharp rich thing!"

"And you take in, I assume," he pursued, "that I'm just going to lean on you, for what I want, with the full weight of a determined man."

"Well," she laughed, "I promise you I'll thoroughly obey the direction of your pressure."

"All right then!" And he stopped before her, in his unrest, monumentally pledged, yet still more massively immeasurable. "How'll you have it?"

She bristled as with all the possible beautiful choices; then she shed her selection as a heaving fruit-tree might have dropped some round ripeness. It was for her friend to pick up his plum and his privilege. "Will you write a cheque?"

"Yes, if you want it right away." To which, however, he added, clapping vainly a breast-pocket: "But my cheque-book's down in my car."

"At the door?" She scarce required his assent to touch a bell. "I can easily send for it." And she threw off while they waited: