here, and they’ll say it’s because I’ve been ill, because I’m a weak old woman, that she’s persuaded me. I’m not well enough yet to fight them one by one, and you’ve got to do it for me.”
“I?” he stammered.
“You. Why not?” she jerked back at him, her round eyes suddenly as sharp as penknives. Her hand fluttered from its chair-arm and lit on his with a clutch of little pale nails like bird-claws. “Why not?” she searchingly repeated.
Archer, under the exposure of her gaze, had recovered his self-possession.
“Oh, I don’t count—I’m too insignificant.”
“Well, you’re Letterblair’s partner, ain’t you? You’ve got to get at them through Letterblair. Unless you’ve got a reason,” she insisted.
“Oh, my dear, I back you to hold your own against them all without my help; but you shall have it if you need it,” he reassured her.
“Then we’re safe!” she sighed; and smiling on him with all her ancient cunning she added, as she settled her head among the cushions: “I always knew you’d back us up, because they never quote you when they talk about its being her duty to go home.”
He winced a little at her terrifying perspicacity, and longed to ask: “And May—do they quote her?” But he judged it safer to turn the question.
“And Madame Olenska? When am I to see her?” he said.
The old lady chuckled, crumpled her lids, and went through the pantomime of archness. “Not today. One at a time, please. Madame Olenska’s gone out.”