Mr. Priestley closed it with a snap. “Very well,” he said, “if you refuse to come with me, I shall go out and buy them alone.” A horrified vision arose before Laura’s eyes of the garments Mr. Priestley might be expected to purchase if left to himself. Sheer desperation presented her with the essentials of a scheme for escaping from the impasse. “Very well,” she said. “I’ll give in, though I don’t approve of it at all. But of course it’s perfectly sweet of you. I’ll let you pay for the clothes on one condition—that I go and buy them alone. You know,” she added persuasively, “you wouldn’t really like coming to lingerie shops with me, would you?” “Not at all,” beamed Mr. Priestley. “But I’ll tell you why I wished to come with you. Because I didn’t want to let you out of my sight! You are an independent girl, and I was afraid that if I let you go out alone you quite possibly would not return.” “Oh!” said Laura, having had this very intention. “I may have been wrong,” continued Mr. Priestley happily, “but I feared that, once you were out of my clutches, so to speak, you would begin to imagine all sorts of foolish things, such as that your presence here might possibly—er—embarrass me, as it were, and that I should not care to be saddled with the responsibility of looking after you. Nothing,” said Mr. Priestley very earnestly, “could in reality be further from the truth. I will, therefore, agree to your condition upon one of my own: that you give me your word of honour to return here whenever you go out, either to-day or to-morrow, take up your residence as I suggested, and look upon this place as your home until all this awkward affair is finally cleared up.” He smiled at her benevolently. “Oh!” said Laura blankly. Now Laura was not one of those feeble-minded creatures who go through life with the fatuous question constantly on their lips: What will people say? She did not care a rap what people said about her (which was perhaps as well); all that concerned her was what she was. But however free from conventional ties a young woman may consider herself, to take up her residence in a bachelor’s flat is not a step to be made without a certain amount of reflection; if one only owes the duty of essentials to oneself, one does owe a certain duty of external appearances to one’s friends and relations. On the other hand, those friends and relations, being themselves clean-minded people, would, if they ever came to hear of the escapade at all, certainly recognise Mr. Priestley for the innocent babe he was.