That pause saved them.

His stick slipped and tumbled down on the landing with a clatter.  We heard him prop it up again.  Our eyes met.  I’m afraid mine said:  “What are you going to do now?”

Then he came in and I saw the gallant Reggie take the shock of him.  I don’t suppose he had ever before met anything like Jevons—­I mean really met him, at close quarters—­in his life.  But he was gallant, and he had his face well under control.  Only the remotest, vanishing quiver and twinkle betrayed the extremity of his astonishment.

Viola, with an admirable air of detachment from Jevons, introduced them.  I don’t know how she did it.  It was as if, without any actual repudiation, she declined to hold herself responsible for Jevons’ appearance; for the extraordinary little bow he made; for his jerky aplomb and for his “Glad to meet you, Captain.”  And for the rest, she just handed him over to her brother and trusted Reggie to be decent to him.

I had wondered:  Are they going to let on that they’ve been out together?  She cannot—­she cannot own up to that.  But how are they going to get out of it, and will he betray her?

I saw how they were going to get out of it.  If they didn’t say in as many words that they’d met on the doorstep they implied it in everything they said.  They asked each other polite questions, all to the tune of:  “What have you been doing since I last saw you?”—­to convey the impression that they had met thus casually after a long interval.  Jevons played up to her well, almost too well; so well, in fact, did he play, that not long afterwards I was to ask myself:  Was this perfection the result of collusion?  Had they anticipated just such a sudden, disconcerting encounter?  Had they thought it all out and arranged with each other beforehand how they should behave?  I don’t know.  I never cared to ask her.

The game lasted some little time.  I didn’t like to see her driven to these shifts (I was afraid, in fact, they’d overdo it), and I came to her help by telling Jevons that Captain Thesiger was an enthusiastic admirer of his work; and Reggie burst in jubilantly—­he was evidently glad to be able to meet Jevons on this happy ground—­with:  “Are you the chap who wrote those things I’ve been reading?  I say, Vee-Vee, you might have told me.”

He fastened upon Jevons then and there.  He started him off on the boxing match.  There was very little about boxing that Reggie didn’t know, but he appealed to Jevons with a charming deference as to an expert.  The dear boy had a good deal of his sister’s innocent veneration for the chaps who wrote the things they’d been reading, who could, that is to say, do something they couldn’t do.

And Jevons, once started on the boxing match, fairly let himself go.  He careered over the field of sport, interrupting his own serious professional elan with all sorts of childlike and spontaneous gambols.  In some of his turns he was entirely lovable.  It was clear that Reggie loved him as you love a strange little animal at play, or any vital object that diverts you.  From his manner I gathered that, provided he were not committed to closer acquaintance with Jevons, he was willing enough to snatch the passing joy of him.