Anna the Adventuress

"I suppose you haven't the least idea who I am," Lady Lescelles said,

as she settled herself in Anna's most comfortable chair.

"I have heard of you, of course," Anna answered hesitatingly,

"but----"

"You cannot imagine what I have come to see you about. Well, I am

Nigel Ennison's sister!"

"Oh!" Anna said.

"Nigel is like all men," Lady Lescelles continued. "He is a sad

blunderer. He has helped me out of scrapes though, no end of times. He

is an awfully good sort--and now he has come to me to help him if I

can. Do you know that he is very much in love with you?"

Anna smiled.

"Well," she admitted. "He has said something of the sort."

"And you have sent him about his business. He tells me that you will

not even see him. I don't want to bother you, of course. A woman has a

perfect right to choose her own husband, but Nigel seemed to think

that there was something a little mysterious about your treatment of

him. You seemed, he thought, to have some grievance which you would

not explain and which he thought must arise from a misunderstanding.

There, that sounds frightfully involved, doesn't it, but perhaps you

can make out what I mean. Don't you care for Nigel at all?"

Anna was silent for a moment or two.

Lady Lescelles, graceful, very fashionably but quietly dressed, leaned

back and watched her with shrewd kindly eyes.

"I like your brother better than any other man I know," Anna said at

last.

"Well, I don't think you told him as much as that, did you?" Lady

Lescelles asked.

"I did not," Anna answered. "To be frank with you, Lady Lescelles,

when your brother asked me the other day to be his wife I was under a

false impression as regards his relations--with some other person. I

know now that I was mistaken."

"That sounds more promising," Lady Lescelles declared. "May I tell

Nigel to come and see you again? I am not here to do his love-making

for him, you know. I came to see you on my own account."

"Thank you very much," Anna said. "It is very nice of you to come, but

I do not think for the present, at any rate, I could give him any

other answer. I do not intend to be married, or to become engaged just

at present."

"Well, why not?" Lady Lescelles asked, smiling. "I can only be a few

years older than you, and I have been married four years. I can assure

you, I wouldn't be single again for worlds. One gets a lot more fun

married."

"Our cases are scarcely similar," Anna remarked.

"Why not?" Lady Lescelles answered. "You are one of the Hampshire

Pellissiers, I know, and your family are quite as good as ours. As for

money, Nigel has tons of it."