"Have a little patience," he said presently. "Take my advice and stay here. If he--if he can, he will send for you, I am sure." She looked up quickly, a spark of anger in her eyes. "You sound as if you think that will never be," she said sharply. Micky met her gaze unflinchingly. "I don't think anything of the sort. I know--I know if I were in his place, whoever he is--I should be counting the moments till I could ... could have you with me." He smothered the momentary seriousness of his words with a little laugh. "And now, after that pretty compliment, aren't you going to reward me by taking my most excellent advice?" The ghost of a smile crossed her face. "I wanted you to say something so different," she told him wistfully. "I know--but I'm not going to. Any one would advise you as I have. It isn't ... it isn't that I'm prejudiced, or anything like that. I would give a great deal to see you happy. I hope you believe me." She sat twisting her hands together nervously. After a moment she looked up at him. "Thank you," she said. She rose and began to pull on her gloves. "I hope you don't think it's very dreadful of me to have come," she said deprecatingly. "But ... but this morning, somehow, I felt I must have someone to talk to--some one to advise me...." "I am honoured that you came," said Micky gravely. Her eyes fell before his. "And--and you won't tell June?" she appealed. He smiled rather sadly. "I am not likely ever to tell any one," he said. "No, I know. Mr. Mellowes"--she held out her hand to him suddenly, her fair face flushing--"I should like to take back something I said to you one day. Perhaps you don't remember, but I do, and lately--especially since last night, when you were so kind--I've felt that I wasn't just to you; and so ... if you will forgive me, I should like to be friends with you after all." She was crimson by the time she had finished, but Micky took her hand without answering, held it for a moment, then let it go. "I suppose I mustn't offer you anything?" he said with forced lightness. "No coffee--or tea? It's cold out this morning. If you would care for anything, my man would bring it at once." She laughed and shook her head. "I don't want anything, thank you." She looked round at Micky's luxuriously furnished room. "Isn't it beautiful?" she asked him. He smiled. "Do you like it? I am glad." "I think it's lovely." She looked up at him. "I seem to have been climbing a ladder lately," she said. "Since I left that awful place in the Brixton Road--where I am now is heaps better than that was, but this----" Micky was silent. It trembled on his lips to say that everything he had in the world was hers if only she would take it, but he knew the utter futility of it. Money and possessions counted very little with her. She would not have minded the house in the Brixton Road at all with the man she loved. He went downstairs with her.