Again he paused and again Ralph repeated that one word, “Well?”
“I don’t love her any more, and I’ve fallen in love with someone else and we want to get married.”
“The sister of that fellow you play cricket with?”
“Yes, that’s it.” He paused, hoping that now Ralph would help him out, but Ralph gave him no assistance, and Roland was forced to plunge again into his confession. “Well, you see, April knows nothing about it. I’ve been a bit of a beast, I suppose. As far as she is concerned the understanding still holds good. She’s still in love with me, at least she thinks she is. It’s--well, you see how it is.”
“Yes, I quite see that. You’ve been playing that old game of yours, of running two girls in two different places, only this time it’s gone less fortunately and you find you’ve got to marry one of them, and April’s the one that’s got to go?”
“And what part exactly do you expect me to play in this comedy?”
There was a long silence. They walked on, Ralph gazing straight in front of him, and Roland glancing sideways at him from time to time to see how the idea had struck him. But he could learn nothing from the set expression of his companion’s face. It was his turn now to employ an interrogatory “Well?” But Ralph did not appear to have heard him. They walked on in silence, till Roland felt some further explanation was demanded of him.
But Ralph cut him short. “I understand quite well; you’re afraid to tell her. You’re ashamed of yourself and you expect me to do your dirty work!”
“Oh, yes, it is. I know you’ll find excuses for yourself, but that’s what it amounts to. And I don’t see why I should do it.”
“That’s like you. Since you’ve met these new friends of yours you’ve dropped your old-time friends one by one. I’ve watched you, and now April, she’s the last to go. You haven’t been to see me for three or four months and now you’ve only come because you want me to do something for you.”
The justice of the remark made Roland wince. He had seen hardly anything of Ralph during the last three years.
“But, Ralph,” he pleaded, “how can I go and tell her myself?”
“If one’s done a rotten thing one owns up to it. It’s the least one can do.”
“What isn’t it? Not a rotten thing to make a girl believe for four years that you’re going to marry her and then chuck her! If that isn’t a rotten thing I don’t know what is!”