“More so than for walking,” he retaliated.  “I’m going to drive you home.”

“At six o’clock?”

“At six o’clock.”

“And suppose I wish to leave before then?”

He cast an expressive glance towards the windows, where the rain could be heard beating relentlessly against the panes.

“It’s quite up to you . . . to walk home.”

Sara made a small grimace of disgust.

“Otherwise,” she said tentatively, “I am going to stay here, whether I will or no?”

He nodded.

“Yes.  It’s my birthday, and I’m proposing to make myself a present of an hour or two of your society,” he replied composedly.

Sara regarded him with curiosity.  He had been openly displeased to find her trespassing on his estate—­which was only what current report would have led her to expect—­yet now he was evincing a desire for her company, and, in addition, a very determined intention to secure it.  The man was an enigma!

“I’m surprised,” she said lightly.  “I gathered from a recent remark of yours that you didn’t think too highly of women.”

“I don’t,” he replied with uncompromising directness.

“Then why—­why——­”

“Perhaps I have a fancy to drop back for a brief space into the life I have renounced,” he suggested mockingly.

“Then you really are what they call you—­a hermit?”

“I really am.”

“And feminine society is taboo?”

“Entirely—­as a rule.”  If, for an instant, the faintest of smiles modified the grim closing of his lips, Sara failed to notice it.

The cold detachment of his answer irritated her.  It was as though he intended to remain, hermit-like, within his shell, and she had a suspicion that behind this barricade he was laughing at her for her ineffectual attempts to dig him out of it with a pin.

“I suppose some woman didn’t fall into your arms just when you wanted her to?” she hazarded.

She had not calculated the result of this thrust.  His eyes blazed for a moment.  Then, a shade of contempt blending with the former cool insouciance of his tone, he said quietly: 

“You don’t expect an answer to that question, do you?”

The snub was unmistakable, and Sara’s cheeks burned.  She felt heartily ashamed of herself, and yet, incongruously, she was half inclined to lay the blame for her impertinent speech on his shoulders.  He had almost challenged her to deal a blow that should crack that impervious shell of his.

She glanced across at him beneath her lashes, and in an instant all thought of personal dignity was wiped out by the look of profound pain that she surprised in his face.  Her shrewd question, uttered almost unthinkingly in the cut-and-thrust of repartee, had got home somewhere on an old wound.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” she exclaimed contritely.

She could only assume that he had not heard her low-voiced apology, for, when he turned to her again, he addressed her exactly as though she had not spoken.