Her voice was deep and rich, and she affected a lazy utterance--half aware that it might warm the blood of the man she was addressing. It did. He had been irritably conscious of its seductiveness in Irene’s dining-room; of the seductiveness, too, of her sensuous grace that had first caught his imagination. “You are a witch, Minna,” he said, admiringly. The echo in his ear of the threadbare commonplace sounded an ironical note. It pleased the girl, however. “I have been longing for a little compliment for a week.” “Why, I saw you the day before yesterday.” “_Cela n’empeche pas._” “Did I behave badly to you?” “No--but I might just as well have been selling you postage-stamps behind a counter.” “Forgive me. But, you see, we met in the street.” “You were ashamed of being seen with me, I suppose.” “Minna!” he exclaimed, flushing into quick earnest. She laughed softly. “I thought I should get something genuine out of you--you walked into the trap beautifully. Do you like my new tea-gown? I had it made because you admired one something like it in a shop window.” She rose and stood before him. She was undeniably beautiful, with warm, southern beauty. From her mother, long since dead, whom chance had brought from Smyrna to the tender keeping of Israel Hart and the fogs of London, she inherited the languor of expression that was her charm. Yet her features, more mutinous than regular, bore little or no trace of the Jewess--none, save that almost imperceptible, strange contour of flesh beneath the eyes, from cheekbone to cheekbone, which is the eternal mark of her race. The soft crepon of the garment clung to her figure, showing its young and supple curves. Its pale yellow shade heightened the richness of her colouring. Hugh expressed unreserved admiration. He had the power of a nice extravagance in praise. The glow deepened on the girl’s face and her eyes lit with gratification. After a quick glance at herself in the mirror of the over-mantel, she sat down again. Her heart had thirsted for his homage, and had drunk it in greedily. “Now tell me all that you have seen and done lately,” she said. An easy task. He had seen no one lovelier than herself. He had sketched her portrait on brief-paper to bring a breath of sweetness into the evil-smelling court. He had the scrap in his letter case. Minna took possession of it, burst into roulades of delighted thanks. He laughed. Compared her murmurings to the low notes of the nightingale. The matter threshed out, Minna reverted to her original demand. He complied, touched on the gossip of the day, spoke lightly of his forthcoming volume of poems. Would he write a poem to her? He tried to explain the severity of his style. Not flesh and blood. Perhaps on the tea-gown. Thus the talk was brought round again to the bewitching garment. “And this--creation--was really to please me?” he asked.