"If I did say the right thing, it was a most fearful fluke," I said, for I could not be silent. "I simply hate men who walk about patting themselves on the back because they have had what they call success with a remark."
He did not listen to what I was saying, but stood staring into the fire; at last he turned round and held out a hand to me.
"I must thank you," he began; "and there is one other thing I have got to ask you before I say good-bye. My father asked me to make you promise that you would never mention what I have told you about his life being saved by your father, or anything about him. It seems to be a sort of compact, I don't understand it. He doesn't want your people to know anything about me, but only you."
I promised, of course, but I felt rather bothered.
"We may meet some day in the street," he said, and he pushed his hand into mine; but I let it go, and told him to sit down again. For this last speech of his was annoying, he had evidently got a wrong idea of me.
"It is no use talking rot," I said. "To begin with, what on earth have you got to thank me for?"
"If Colonel Marten hadn't saved my father's life, I should never have been born," he said.
"And you have come to thank me for that?" I said, and I did not mean to be rude.
I looked at him and we both laughed, though I went on laughing long after he had stopped. The idea of me being thanked for anybody's existence was beautifully comic.
"It is very good of you to have come," I said, as soon as I could; "but I don't deserve any thanks and you know that I don't."
"You haven't got much to do with it, perhaps, but you were here and I should never have been forgiven if I hadn't come to see you. I shan't come again."
"Oh, bosh," I replied. "What's the good of talking stuff like that? Of course you will come again, and I am coming to see you, if I may. How long have you been up here?"
"This is the beginning of my third year."
"What did you get in Mods?" I asked, for I felt sure that he had done well.
"You may just as well, for I shall easily find out."
He stood up again, and talked as he strode up and down my room.
"I have been here two years," he began, "and I know that it is impossible for us to be friends; and when you have thought it over you will think as I do. My father teaches fencing and boxing in London; I was educated at a school you never heard of; I am helped here by an old gentleman who discovered that I was more or less intelligent. He has a mania for experiments, and I am his latest hobby. Have I said enough to put you off, or must I go on?"