I held out my hand to help her to the ground, but she paused on the
second step.
"Mr. Crocker," she observed archly, "I believe you once told me you had
not known many girls in your life."
"True," I said; "why do you ask?"
"I wished to be sure of it," she replied.
And jumping down without my assistance, she laughed and disappeared into
the house.
THE CELEBRITY
By Winston Churchill
VOLUME 3.
CHAPTER IX
That evening I lighted a cigar and went down to sit on the outermost
pile of the Asquith dock to commune with myself. To say that I was
disappointed in Miss Thorn would be to set a mild value on my feelings.
I was angry, even aggressive, over her defence of the Celebrity. I had
gone over to Mohair that day with a hope that some good reason was at the
bottom of her tolerance for him, and had come back without any hope. She
not only tolerated him, but, wonderful to be said, plainly liked him.
Had she not praised him, and defended him, and become indignant when I
spoke my mind about him? And I would have taken my oath, two weeks
before, that nothing short of hypnotic influence could have changed her.
By her own confession she had come to Asquith with her eyes opened, and,
what was more, seen another girl wrecked on the same reef.
Farrar followed me out presently, and I had an impulse to submit the
problem as it stood to him. But it was a long story, and I did not
believe that if he were in my boots he would have consulted me.
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