“Oh, it will be business all right,” Jim said. “Garland never thinks of anything else. But it would also be good business for him if, where a woman is concerned, he could spite me and put a spoke in my wheel. He is all right in every other way, gets me jobs and lends me money, but he disapproves of my success with girls. Did you see him glaring at us at lunch today?”
“It all seems rather silly to me,” Karina said with what she hoped was dignity. “After all we had only met today for the first time.”
“It would not have mattered if it had been the fifty-fifth time,” Jim said. “Garland would have tried to save you from my evil influence. He really believes I am a modern Don Juan-c*m-Casanova. Pathetic, isn’t it?”
“And aren’t you?” Karina asked with a little smile.
Jim smiled back.
“I hope
