“She has made an impression on you, Bob,” said I, but in so sedulously inoffensive a manner that his self-betrayal was all the greater when he told me quite hotly not to be an ass.

Now I was more than ten years his senior, and Bob’s manners were as charming as only the manners of a nice Eton boy can be; therefore I held my peace, but with difficulty refrained from nodding sapiently to myself.  We took a couple of steps in silence, then Bob stopped short.  I did the same.  He was still a little stern; we were just within range of the veranda lights, and I can see and hear him to this day, almost as clearly as I did that night.

“I’m not much good at making apologies,” he began, with rather less grace than becomes an apologist; but it was more than enough for me from Bob.

“Nor I at receiving them, my dear Bob.”

“Well, you’ve got to receive one now, whether you accept it or not.  I was the ass myself, and I beg your pardon!”

Somehow I felt it was a good deal for a lad to say, at that age, and with Bob’s upbringing and popularity, even though he said it rather scornfully in the fewest words.  The scorn was really for himself, and I could well understand it.  Nay, I was glad to have something to forgive in the beginning, I with my unforgivable mission, and would have laughed the matter off without another word if Bob had let me.

“I’m a bit raw on the point,” said he, taking my arm for a last turn, “and that’s the truth.  There was a fellow who came out with me, quite a good chap really, and a tremendous pal of mine at Eton, yet he behaved like a lunatic about this very thing.  Poor chap, he reads like anything, and I suppose he’d been overdoing it, for he actually asked me to choose between Mrs. Lascelles and himself!  What could a fellow do but let the poor old simpleton go?  They seem to think you can’t be pals with a woman without wanting to make love to her.  Such utter rot!  I confess I lose my hair with them; but that doesn’t excuse me in the least for losing it with you.”

I assured him, on the other hand, that his very natural irritability on the subject made all the difference in the world.  “But whom,” I added, “do you mean by ‘them’?  Not anybody else in the hotel?”

“Good heavens, no!” cried Bob, finding a fair target for his scorn at last.  “Do you think I care twopence what’s said or thought by people I never saw in my life before and am never likely to see again?  I know how I’m behaving.  What does it matter what they think?  Not that they’re likely to bother their heads about us any more than we do about them.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I certainly don’t care,” declared my lordly youth, with obvious sincerity.  “No, I was only thinking of poor old George Kennerley and people like him, if there are any.  I did care what he thought, that is until I saw he was as mad as anything on the subject.  It was too silly.  I tell you what, though, I’d value your opinion!” And he came to another stop and confronted me again, but this time such a picture of boyish impulse and of innocent trust in me (even by that faint light) that I was myself strongly inclined to be honest with him on the spot.  But I only smiled and shook my head.