She felt that if only she could know why he had
changed so completely towards her, why the interest she had so
obviously awakened in him upon first meeting had waned and died, she
might be able to thrust him completely out of her thoughts, and accept
him merely as the casual acquaintance which was all he apparently
claimed to be. But the restless, irritable longing to know, to have
his incomprehensible behaviour explained, kept him ever in her mind.
Only once or twice had his name been mentioned between Olga Lermontof
and herself, and on each occasion the former had repeated her caution,
admonishing Diana to have nothing to do with him. It almost seemed as
though she had some personal feeling of dislike towards him. Indeed
Diana had accused her of it, only to be met with a quiet negative.
"No," she had replied serenely. "I don't dislike him. But I
disapprove of much that he does."
"He is rather an attractive person," Diana ventured tentatively.
Olga Lermontof shot a keen glance at her.
"Well, I advise you not to give him your friendship," she said,
"or"--sneeringly--"anything of greater value."
A sharp rat-tat at the door of her sitting-room recalled Diana's
wandering thoughts to the present. She threw a glance of half-comic
dismay at the state of her sitting-room--every available chair and
table seemed to be strewn with the contents of the trunks she was
unpacking--and then, with a resigned shrug of her shoulders, she
crossed to the door and threw it open.
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