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cotton dress clung limply, and her hair was blown by the breeze into untidy disorder. She looked oddly immature for all her self-possession and twenty years, and his face softened, though his words were harsh. 'At the moment you look like an escapee from a vicarage garden party.'
    'Oh!' She supposed the floral print did look a little parochial, but she found this request much harder to accept than the erotic favours she had previously envisaged. It seemed to impinge upon her personal liberty. She was not surprised he had not been impressed by his first sight o£ her when he had dubbed her a brown sparrow, but when he called the dress she was wearing pretty-pretty it was a slur upon her taste. What sort of freak did he want to make of her if she agreed to his whim, and what was his object in wishing to remould her?
    'Of course I wouldn't wear a dress like this for work,' she said primly. 'A secretary should look unobtrusive.'
    She thought of the pseudo-blonde girls with their paint and false eyelashes who had been her colleagues at night school and who had been chosen in preference to herself as personal attendants by business executives. Was Chris suggesting that he wanted her to look as they did?
    'Mine shouldn't. She will have to be a bit of a dragon to guard my privacy, also she may have to deputise for me upon occasion. She should appear elegant and immaculate to do me credit as well as herself. You have the potential, my darling, the right clothes and make-up will do the rest.'
    Clare did not at all want to be shaped according to his fancy, but she was becoming eager to accept the job, so all she said was:
    'You shouldn't call me darling, that's not businesslike.'
    'Everyone does in the Profession,' he remarked.
    'The Pro ... Oh, you mean the stage. Of course, you write plays.'
    'Which are sometimes performed.'
    This surprised her. 'Then you're not unrecognised?'
    'I'm on my way up.'
    'Then I can't conceive why you bothered to go to Mrs Cullingford's soiree ,' she voiced her astonishment. 'She collects failures and beginners.'
    'Poor souls, they were a seedy lot,' he admitted absently. 'I went at Forbes' insistence the first time out of curiosity.
    I'd never met a lady novelist, and the second time to see you again.'
    Clare was incredulous. 'A brown sparrow?'
    'As I told you, I'm short of a secretary and it seemed to me that you might suit me.'
    'Without enquiring about my qualifications, or knowing if I were efficient?' she enquired, a little dashed by his prosaic explanation.
    'Anyone who could cope with Madame Monica would have to be efficient,' he told her. 'My own observations bore that out. So you accept?'
    'Oh, please don't rush me.' The situation sounded both interesting and exciting, but some inner sense was warning her that she should not put too great a trust in Christopher Raines.
    'You'll be a fool if you don't,' he said succinctly.
    Clare was not given to hasty decisions, not being naturally impetuous, but meeting those hawk-like amber eyes, a new recklessness stirred within her. If she never ran any risks she would never climb out of the rut, and she was heartily tired of Monica's posturings.
    'I accept,' she said quietly. She would have to give Mrs Cullingford a month's notice, which would give her time to reconsider if Chris' demands proved too exorbitant.
    'Good girl,' he said approvingly.
    'But you do realise that I'll expect my salary paid regularly?' she emphasised, for she knew artists and authors had a reputation for being casual over such matters.
    'Mercenary little sparrow,' Christopher returned pleasantly. 'I promise you it will be, and I'll damned well make you earn it!'
     

CHAPTER THREE
    C LARE'S expectation of a month's respite during which she could change her mind about accepting Christopher's offer if it seemed expedient was not fulfilled. Instead she was precipitated into a whirlpool of events that nearly shipwrecked her.
    As they continued their expedition she reflected that during