Page:Tongues of Flame (1924).pdf/23

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Chapter II

HARRINGTON reached out and touched the button and began to get through with his callers.

Quickly but considerately, although with that slightly bored air which characterized his manner, he dealt with each.

A certain accumulated atmosphere of misery and gloom, these clients left behind them; then all at once sweetness and light came in, dispelling the gloom as the morning sun dispels a fog. The young woman had entered. She presented quite as much beauty to Henry's gaze as she had to Charlie Clayton's, only Harrington was not so much impressed by beauty.

The young lady was not over five feet and an inch. She wore a belted suit of some tan shade, with brown silk stockings and oxfords that matched. She was unmistakably Caucasian and yet there was something about her just as unmistakably not Caucasian.

"Kanaka strain—Kanaka away up here where the Japan Current comes down," thought Henry to himself as he noted the spun jet gloss of her hair.

"Mr. Harrington?" the girl inquired in a voice that was low and rich and carried the slightest possible trace of accent.

"I am Henry Harrington," said the young lawyer, rising politely, while noticing that his visitor's expression beneath its mask of modest beauty was wistful and concerned. "Will you be seated?"