Page:The Works of H G Wells Volume 7.pdf/277

 She had come up with him now. "May I have my sheet of paper, please?" she said with a catching of her breath. She was a couple of inches less in height than he. Do you observe her half-open lips, said Mother Nature in a noiseless aside to Mr. Lewisham—a thing he afterwards recalled. In her eyes was a touch of apprehension.

"I say," he said, with protest still uppermost. "You oughtn't to do this."

"Do what?"

"This. Impositions. For my boys."

She raised her eyebrows, then knitted them momentarily, and looked at him. "Are you Mr. Lewisham?" she asked with an affectation of entire ignorance and discovery.

She knew him perfectly well, which was one reason why she was writing the imposition, but pretending not to know gave her something to say.

Mr. Lewisham nodded.

"Of all people! Then"—frankly—"you have just found me out."

"I am afraid I have," said Lewisham. "I am afraid I have found you out."

They looked at one another for the next move. She decided to plead in extenuation.

"Teddy Frobisher is my cousin. I know it's very wrong, but he seemed to have such a lot to do and to be in such trouble. And I had nothing to do. In fact, it was I who offered."

She stopped and looked at him. She seemed to consider her remark complete.

That meeting of the eyes had an oddly disconcerting quality. He tried to keep to the business