All this with a sustained, holding stare which, in conjunction with the general inanity of the discourse, conveyed the impression of mild, dreary lunacy.  And when he hitched his chair a little and dropped his voice to the low note of mystery, it flashed upon me that high professional reputation was not necessarily a guarantee of sound mind.

It never occurred to me then that I didn’t know in what soundness of mind exactly consisted and what a delicate and, upon the whole, unimportant matter it was.  With some idea of not hurting his feelings I blinked at him in an interested manner.  But when he proceeded to ask me mysteriously whether I remembered what had passed just now between that Steward of ours and “that man Hamilton,” I only grunted sourly assent and turned away my head.

“Aye.  But do you remember every word?” he insisted tactfully.

“I don’t know.  It’s none of my business,” I snapped out, consigning, moreover, the Steward and Hamilton aloud to eternal perdition.

I meant to be very energetic and final, but Captain Giles continued to gaze at me thoughtfully.  Nothing could stop him.  He went on to point out that my personality was involved in that conversation.  When I tried to preserve the semblance of unconcern he became positively cruel.  I heard what the man had said?  Yes?  What did I think of it then?—­he wanted to know.

Captain Giles’ appearance excluding the suspicion of mere sly malice, I came to the conclusion that he was simply the most tactless idiot on earth.  I almost despised myself for the weakness of attempting to enlighten his common understanding.  I started to explain that I did not think anything whatever.  Hamilton was not worth a thought.  What such an offensive loafer . . .  “Aye! that he is,” interjected Captain Giles . . . thought or said was below any decent man’s contempt, and I did not propose to take the slightest notice of it.

This attitude seemed to me so simple and obvious that I was really astonished at Giles giving no sign of assent.  Such perfect stupidity was almost interesting.

“What would you like me to do?” I asked, laughing.  “I can’t start a row with him because of the opinion he has formed of me.  Of course, I’ve heard of the contemptuous way he alludes to me.  But he doesn’t intrude his contempt on my notice.  He has never expressed it in my hearing.  For even just now he didn’t know we could hear him.  I should only make myself ridiculous.”

That hopeless Giles went on puffing at his pipe moodily.  All at once his face cleared, and he spoke.

“You missed my point.”

“Have I?  I am very glad to hear it,” I said.

With increasing animation he stated again that I had missed his point.  Entirely.  And in a tone of growing self-conscious complacency he told me that few things escaped his attention, and he was rather used to think them out, and generally from his experience of life and men arrived at the right conclusion.