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Guelder to do my best to help you, and — Well, what do you say? I don’t suppose you’ve very much luggage, so if we call a taxi we can remove you straight away without difficulty, and Dr. Guelder can come back here tonight with a clear conscience. I’m quite sure we shall get along very well together”—trying to infuse a friendly note into her voice.
    “Then you want me to come with you immediately?” Stacey asked, looking almost perturbed.
    “Of course, my dear. Otherwise I wouldn’t have come hurrying here like this.”
    “I see. No; of course, I suppose you wouldn’t.”
    “And Dr. Guelder does know about my visit”— with emphasis.
    Once again Stacey’s ready color rose.
    “Don’t think I like keeping him out of his flat!— of course I shall be only too happy for him to be able to come back, but I’d like to be able to thank him.”
    “You can thank him on the telephone—from my flat!”
    “Yes—yes; I suppose so”—doubtfully.
    “And I expect you’ll see him some time—sometimes he looks in at the shop, when he’s taking me out to lunch or dinner. And in any case I can thank him for you.”
    Stacey realized that there was no way of escape. “Very well, then,” she said. “I’d better get my things packed.” She paused. “And thank you very much, Miss Hunt,” she added, hoping she sounded sufficiently grateful. “It’s good of you—very good of you to offer me a job when you know practically nothing about me.”
    “That’s quite all right, my child,” Miss Hunt assured her, with her smile which was quite brilliant when it was not merely confined to her lips. And she added: “And don’t forget that I am also offering you a home!”
    Stacey went away to pack her things and take her last look at Martin Guelder’s slightly monastic bedroom with the feeling that somehow she had been caught up in a web, and although Vera Hunt was a very elegant spider she was a very insignificant fly.

 
    CHAPTER THREE
    She f elt more insignificant than ever when they arrived at Miss Hunt’s flat. The furnishings were nothing short of exquisite, and somehow they reflected the coolness and the composure of Miss Hunt’s personality.
    Ice blue walls in the dining room, and unstained oak furniture, a black carpet in the lounge, silvery net curtains cascading on to the floor like miniature waterfalls, and exquisitely painted panels representing birds and flowers let into the walls. Miss Hunt’s own bedroom was all white, even to the bedside lampshade and the quilted bed-head, and there was a little room which was really no more than a slip room which contained a divan covered in pale lime chintz, a bookcase, a dressing table and an armchair, which was handed over to Stacey, and wherein her unpretentious suitcase was deposited.
    Stacey felt utterly strange as she stood looking round this room and wondering whether for her it would ever have any feelings of warmth or welcome. As a bedroom it had advantages over one which might have been offered her in a hostel, but in some ways she thought she would have preferred the hostel.
    Miss Hunt was dining out that night, and Stacey was invited to concoct herself a meal out of the contents of the refrigerator in the kitchen, and when it was over she sat in a kind of solitary state in the black and silver lounge and wondered how she would like it when she began work in the shop the following day. Her new employer had made no further reference to her ringing Martin Guelder to thank him for placing his flat at her disposal as he had done, and explain why she had left without waiting to thank him personally, but she had promised that a message would be conveyed to him, as a result of which he would be reoccupying the flat that night. However, suddenly Stacey caught sight of the telephone on its rest and decided to put through a call herself, for she was not quite easy in her mind over the abrupt method of her departure.
    But Mrs. Elbe, when she answered, told her