"Why, to be sure. You know, we always go to the theatre together. Only for her I should be quite alone."
"And do you like this kind of thing?" he asks clumsily.
She bursts into a merry laugh. "Like it? Why, I get my living by it. We all have to live, you know, and I've no one to look out for me but myself, and----"
She pauses suddenly, having caught his eye fixed upon her with a gaze of passionate admiration. This first calls up the look of gravity we have spoken of, and then brings the color sharply to her face. It also reminds her of the somewhat peculiar character of the interview. The instant after she resumes, as if continuing her sentence, "Did you come here to ask me that?"
"No," he replies bluntly. "I never thought of the question until the moment before I asked it."
"Please tell me, then," she proceeds, with gathering surprise, "what _did_ you come for?"
He hesitates a moment, moved by the superstition or the honest feeling that he must tell her no word of untruth, and then quietly answers:
"Perhaps, then, you'll go away, and when you _are_ sure----"
"I didn't say that. You look and talk like a gentleman, and if, as I hope, you are one, you will know that I can't see strangers--people who have no business with me--and so you must excuse me." She has risen and moves with some dignity toward the door.
"One moment," he interposes. "Forgive me; you know for your part that it is impossible I should wish to offend----"
"How should I? You come here to me a stranger, and refuse to say what for."
"No. I did not refuse. I only said I was not sure that I knew why I came."
"Then you must be crazy!" she blurts out impulsively.
"Then I wish you would go away!" she goes on with apprehension. "I'll tell you what, Mr. Bellario is here, and he's--oh, terribly strong!"
"Yes. The 'Blood-Red Demon,' you know. Didn't you see him go through the traps?"
Harding laughs, very much amused. "And you mean to threaten me with the 'Blood-Red Demon,' do you?"
"Oh, no," she responds gently, but again edging toward the door--"not threaten; but"--in a very conciliatory tone--"if you won't say what you come for and won't go away----"
"Will both. I will say what I came for and then I will go away."
"I don't mean to be rude, you know," she puts in, softening.