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 had the intuitions of her sex to guide her; and she felt instinctively that there might be a great deal behind these graces. She was grateful all the same; they were much needed balm for many bruises.

When Mr. Keller sat down again in the wicker chair, about two yards away from her, a sense of languor crept upon June. The warmth of the fire, the glow of the lamp, the notes of a singularly quiet voice were like a subtle drug. Alive to danger as she was, its caress was hard to resist. Such a position was one of acute peril, for she was literally throwing herself upon the mercy of a person who was very much an unknown quantity, yet what alternative was there?

"Don't mind a pipe, I hope?" The polite voice from the chair opposite was not really ironical; it was merely kind and friendly, yet feminine intuition shivering upon the dark threshold of a mighty adventure knew well enough how easily a tone of that kind could turn to something else.

"Oh no, I don't mind at all." She tried again to get the right key, but a laugh she could not control, high-pitched and irrelevant, was horribly betraying.

"That's all right then."

For about a minute, Mr. Keller puffed away in a sort of whimsical silence. Then he said with a soft fall, whose mere sweetness had the power to alarm, "Your hair's jolly. Very jolly indeed!"

June nervously muttered that she was very glad he liked it.

"So much of it, don't you know. Awfully useful to me just now. Quantity's almost as valuable as the colour. Does it reach your waist when you let it down?"