drink another cup and keep you company.’
‘Of course,’ he said, before Beth could get her mouth open; Mrs Silver had gone by the time she managed: ‘I had coffee after dinner, thank you.’
‘You would prefer something else?’ His voice was blandly charming.
‘No, thanks.’ She spoke firmly and wondered how it was that ten minutes later she was sitting there with a cup of coffee in her hand, and moreover, eating a sandwich. She was still there an hour later; she had forgotten that her companion was someone who, in the ordinary way, she would have addressed as sir, taken his word for law in theatre, and if she had encountered him outside their working sphere, wished him a sedate time of day and nothing more; she only knew that she was content to sit in his company, listening to his mild nothings and replying in kind. The handsome ormolu clock on the mantelpiece chiming the hour recalled her to the astonishing fact that it was midnight.
‘Heavens, I never meant to stay as long as this,’ she exclaimed, aware of regret as she jumped to her feet and made for the door. The professor had got to his feet too and with his hand on the door she stopped short.
‘The messages,’ she exclaimed again, ‘you had some messages for me.’
He opened the door. ‘I am ashamed to say that I have forgotten every one of them—they couldn’t have been of much importance, could they? Your room is comfortable? You have everything you want?’
She told him yes, feeling a little uneasy about the messages, but there seemed nothing she could do about them now, so she wished him a good night and went to her room, where later, and still very wide awake, she thought about the evening, telling herself at the same time that it was only because she had been feeling lonely that she had found his company so very pleasant.
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