He smiled in answer. “Well, perhaps,—better than some. Is there really nothing you can do to fill in time for the present? Because—I can find you another secretary’s job later on, if that is what you really want.” “Can you?” she said. “But how?” He was aware of a momentary embarrassment, and showed it. “It’s entirely a business proposition. I am just home from Africa. I am going to write a book on travel and sport. I’ve got my notes, heaps of ’em. It’s just a matter of sorting and arranging in a fairly digestible form. I shall want a secretary, and I have an idea we would arrive at an arrangement not injurious to either of us. You can help me if you will—if you care to—and I should think myself lucky to get anyone so efficient.” “How do you know I am efficient?” she asked in her straight, direct way. He laughed a little. “Oh, that! Well, mainly by the way you headed me off this morning when I showed a disposition to interrupt the progress of your work.” “I see.” She spoke quietly, without elation. His suggestion seemed to excite no surprise in her, and he wondered a little while he waited for more. “Do you want me to decide at once?” she asked. “Don’t you want to?” he continued. “You have no one—apparently—to consult but yourself.” “That is true. But—” she spoke gravely—“it takes a little while to consult even oneself sometimes. What if I took up work with you and found I did not like it?” “You would be under no obligation to stop,” he said, aware of a sudden, inexplicable desire to overcome her objections. “And you would be no worse off than you are at present. But—I flatter myself you would like it. I think the work would interest you. I am convinced at least that it would not bore you.” “That consideration would not influence me one way or the other,” she said. “There are always drawbacks of some description to every walk of life, and boredom—well, boredom is by no means the worst of them.” “There I disagree with you,” said Rotherby boldly. “If you can honestly say that, then you have never really lived.” “That is quite true,” said Frances. “I never have.” He gave her a sudden, hard look. “Don’t you want to?” he said. She uttered her faint laugh, avoiding his eyes. “I don’t—especially—want to starve,” she said. “But—I assure you I would rather do that than fail to earn my keep.” “I fully realize that,” he said. “Will you give me a trial then, or let me give you one? I don’t know how you put these things, but it means the same thing, I believe.” “Oh no!” said Frances. “It means something very different. And neither you nor I had better make up our minds to-night. You are very kind, but very rash; and I think by to-morrow morning you may regret this. In any case, let us wait till then!” “For your satisfaction or mine?” he said. “For both.” Prompt and steady came her reply, but he was disconcerted no longer. “Will you tell me one thing?” he said. Her eyes came to his. “Certainly if I can.”