"Indeed? A sense of duty brought you, perhaps?"

"A sense of duty, beyond a doubt," the man assented politely.

She felt like passing on--but she also felt like staying, so she stayed.

"Cannot I help you towards the further accomplishment of your duty,
then?" she enquired.

He looked at her and the grim severity of his face was lightened by a
smile.

"You could help me more easily to forget it," he replied.

She opened her lips, hesitated and closed them again. Already she had
recognised the fact that this was not a man to be snubbed. Neither had
she, notwithstanding her momentary irritation, any real desire to do so.

"You do not know many people here?"

"I know no one," he confessed.

"I am Elisabeth Landon," she told him. "Mr. Foley is my uncle. My
mother and I live with him and always help him to entertain."

"Hence your interest in a lonely stranger," he remarked. "Please have
no qualms about me. I am always interested when I am permitted to watch
my fellow creatures, especially when the types are novel to me."