She rose and accompanied us to the landing outside the flat door.  After saying good-bye to Dale, who went down with his boyish tread, she detained me for a second or two, holding my hand, and again her clasp enveloped it like some clinging sea-plant.  She looked at me very wistfully.

“The next time you come, Mr. de Gex, do come as a friend and not as an enemy.”

I was startled.  I thought I had conducted the interview with peculiar suavity.

“An enemy, dear lady?”

“Yes.  Can’t I see it?” she said in her languorous, caressing voice.  “And I should love to have you for a friend.  You could be such a good one.  I have so few.”

“I must argue this out with you another time,” said I diplomatically.

“That’s a promise,” said Lola Brandt.

“What’s a promise?” asked Dale, when I joined him in the hall.

“That I will do myself the pleasure of calling on Madame again.”

The porter whistled for a cab.  A hansom drove up.  As my destination was the Albany, and as I knew Dale was going home to Eccleston Square, I held out my hand.

“Good-bye, Dale.  I’ll see you to-morrow.”

“But aren’t you going to tell me what you think of her?” he cried in great dismay.

The pavement was muddy, the evening dark, and a gusty wind blew the drizzle into our faces.  It is only the preposterously young who expect a man to rhapsodise over somebody else’s inamorata at such a moment.  I turned up the fur collar of my coat.

“She is good-looking,” said I.

“Any idiot can see that!” he burst out impatiently.  “I want to know what opinion you formed of her.”

I reflected.  If I could have labelled her as the Scarlet Woman, the Martyred Saint, the Jolly Bohemian, or the Bold Adventuress, my task would have been easy.  But I had an uncomfortable feeling that Lola Brandt was not to be classified in so simple a fashion.  I took refuge in a negative.

“She would hardly be a success,” said I, “in serious political circles.”

With that I made my escape.

CHAPTER V

I wish I had not called on Lola Brandt.  She disturbs me to the point of nightmare.  In a fit of dream paralysis last night I fancied myself stalked by a panther, which in the act of springing turned into Lola Brandt.  What she would have done I know not, for I awoke; but I have a haunting sensation that she was about to devour me.  Now, a woman who would devour a sleeping Member of Parliament is not a fit consort for a youth about to enter on a political career.